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r e ’ s t h l e g g u a From a childhood with no creative limits, Whitney McGregor is positioned to be design’s next big thing.
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R N A y FO BLES // p h o t o g r a p h y b
“A HOUSE IS ALMOST a maternal being, the way it shelters and holds people,” Whitney McGregor muses, “it will tell you what it wants to be, if you listen.” The Greenville-based designer’s reverence for place and intuitive listening comes from her mom, Chris Whitney Arthur. Growing up in a household committed to the arts and elevated experiences, McGregor was gifted an almost spiritual sense of space and color. It’s a legacy she continually reaps the benefits of in her flourishing design business, and when her mother found a cottage in Augusta Circle, she seized the opportunity to transform the space into a sunlit, artfilled testament of their creative bond. A collaboration, you could say, that was years in the making. Throughout her childhood in Columbus, Ohio,
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McGregor and her mom were more like “buddies, almost like roomies,” Arthur remembers. The two spent days creating artwork, rearranging rooms, designing and dreaming. “We have been collaborating for as long as I can remember,” says McGregor. “I’m the youngest in my family by ten years, and for most of my growing up everybody was out the house. It was just me and my mom getting in all kinds of trouble doing house projects.” Alongside such conviviality bloomed a deep level of trust, and freedom reigned. If 16-year old McGregor wanted to paint the floor in her bedroom? Just make sure to clean up the mess. Fly to Chicago to see Mikal Baryshnikov dance? Spend Sundays at the Columbus
at Home | SPRING 2021
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