A life well lived.
Early life in Rochester, NY
Margaret ‘Peggy’ Weber was born on January 6, 1953 in Rochester, NY, the oldest daughter of John Weber, a Harvard educated businessman, and Dorothy Needham Weber, a Barnard educated Education Administrator in the Rochester Public School System. From her earliest years, she showed an interest and talent in the Arts; painting, sculpture, photography and fashion design. The second oldest of 6 children, she attended Rochester Public Schools, with as much of a focus on the Arts as was possible at the time. She graduated from Rochester East High School in 1971 and moved to Boston, MA to pursue her artistic and fashion design career.Clothware in Cambridge, MA
After settling in Boston’s Beacon Hill neighborhood, Peggy began classes at the Museum School of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, one of the best known Museum based Art Schools in the US. Through friends, she met her life-long friend and collaborator Donna Southwell in 1972, and the two, who shared a common interest in art and fashion design, began a fashion design business in Cambridge, MA called Clothware. Located in Harvard Square, Clothware grew from the two original partners, to a collective of five designers ‘By Women, For Women’, that became very successful. Clothware flourishes to this day and is still located in Harvard Square.Love! Early years with Britt
During the formative years of Clothware, and her continuing work at the Museum School, Peggy met, through a mutual friend, a young Harvard student named Britt Hall. The two shared a mutual love of music and art, and, eventually, each other. Britt’s family had a small house in the Annisquam section of the City of Gloucester, MA, on Cape Ann, where the two spent as much time as possible. Cape Ann became a frequent subject of Peggy’s artistic experimentation from this time, and many of her works throughout her career have this beautiful and historic part of Massachusetts as a subject.The Texas years, Wedding, birth of Amelia
In 1978, after 6 successful years at Clothware, Peggy decided to complete her degree in Fine Art. She and Britt moved to Austin, TX, where she enrolled in the Fine Art program at The University of Texas at Austin. This move was decided on after a 6 month trip around the US during which she visited a variety of Fine Art programs. The Hill Country of Central Texas became a new and different setting for her artistic expression. Oil paintings of this period, through 1986, make up a large part of her collected works.During her years in Texas, Peggy’s relationship with Britt continued to grow, and the two decided to make their bond permanent; they were married on August 6, 1983 in Peggy’s Family Home in Rochester.
Further cementing their relationship, Peggy and Britt’s daughter Amelia was born on December 28, 1984. Amelia became a source of constant inspiration, and she became a student of the arts as well. Amelia studies functional genomics, and earned a PhD in microbiology from their alma mater, The University of Texas.
The return to Massachusetts, Sherborn and birth of Jane
After nine years in Austin, Peggy and Britt returned to Massachusetts in 1986, returning to Britt’s family home in Sherborn, MA. Peggy decided to complete her undergraduate degree at Harvard while continuing her artistic endeavors with another major interest; the Forests and Hills of Sherborn, and the Charles River, which flowed near their home in Sherborn.Peggy and Britt’s second daughter, Jane, named for Peggy’s sister and long-time best friend Jane Weber Straus, was born on January 17, 1991. Jane also showed a strong interest in the Arts and became a botanist and horticulturist after graduating from The University of Massachusetts at Amherst.