Pacific Heights Parisian
July 1, 2006
Peripatetic interior designer Monty Collins, with a busy practice split among
Palm Springs, San Francisco and Seattle, believes somewhat paradoxically in
taking it slow, in celebrating process and waiting for those percolating ideas
that reward the patient—even when he feels hurried (or harried). His work on
Barbara and David Crossen’s Pacific Heights townhouse in San Francisco shows the
wisdom of his approach, and what can evolve when designer and client, in
cahoots, take time to inventory not only work orders and “to buy” lists, but
internal and aesthetic wish lists and lifestyle priorities as well.
The design aesthetic of Barbara and David Crossens’ San Francisco home is
defined by the simple elegance of the foyer, with its custom iron staircase by
Jensen’s Ornamental in Napa, hand-painted walnut floors, antique Swedish chair
and sculptural table. The interior design is by Palm Springs–based Monty
Collins.
Born and
raised in the Deep South (Mobile, Ala., to be exact), Collins came of age
with a profound respect for—in the words he says an Alabamian lady used to lure
In Cold Blood triumphant Truman Capote from New York down South to speak at
her local ladies’ guild—“space, place and grace.” Capote went. So too would
Collins, especially if the request came from a client—because while many
designers find inspiration from their clients’ lives, he found the beginning
of a career. “I’ve never met a stranger,” says Collins, stating what is
obvious within a few minutes’ conversation. That friendliness, based on good
manners and an innate discretion, made him a favorite teenage “picker” among his
mother’s friends: “Find me a great hunt board!” “If you should chance upon a
lovely, ee-normous ol’ farm table, well then. …” A love of the hunt, even more
of the perfect catch, came early, as did success in a rarefied, yet countrified,
adult world. Collins says simply, “There are a lot of great pieces to be found
in barns.”
In the master bedroom, a leather chair and chinoiserie desk are positioned to
overlook the Golden Gate Bridge.
After his precocious start came process: a marketing degree, a
real estate appraisal company—nuts and bolts that paved a Mobile-to-Atlanta move
followed by a stint at a frame shop cum art gallery. Next he ran a shop
specializing in English antiques, then he became a furniture importer-exporter
followed by a gig at a commercial carpet shop. “I definitely had a method,” he
says. “I wouldn’t be rushed.” 
The cast-glass torso sculpture near the living room’s bay windows is by
Steve Tobin.
Until the day he was. Collins got a call from
an acquaintance whose friend’s daughter was in Atlanta with a big new house, no
furniture and a burgeoning (soon implacable) desire to marry her boyfriend in
the house within a year. She told Collins to quit his job, that she’d
guarantee to match his salary. Still, he demurred. Luckily she knew it was time for the cocoon to come off. “ ‘You’ve got It, and you’re doing it,’ she
said to me. And I listened,” Collins says. The house got finished, the girl
married and Collins started. Since then, Collins has repaid his karmic debt by
becoming a sort of “client whisperer,” one who looks, even intuits, what clients
are really saying, what they really want. 
In the living room, a pair of white tufted-leather chairs from the 1930s are
placed opposite a pair of scooped-back chairs with lion’s head finials that
were found at an Atlanta flea market and refurbished. Between them is a Michael
Taylor Schiaparelli sofa covered in velvet and a coffee table made from a
vintage mirror. At left is The Trick of the Mirror by Roberto Marquez; at right
is Katheryn Holt’s Seated Figure.
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