Terry Ryan has spent her entire life immersed in art and design. While she began drawing and painting  from the moment she could hold the tools, her preferred forms of expression were always tactile and  dimensional – collages and assemblages, environments, and textile arts. The need for materials and  objects for these works of art formed the beginning of her life-long interest in objects, space, and design.  

As a studio art/ art-history major at Seton Hall University, she was attracted to in the decorative arts and pursued every opportunity to study abroad, completing Parsons first summer program in French decorative arts and architecture at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, as well as Christie’s one-year program in the fine and decorative arts, in London.  

Her professional life began at Christie’s, New York, Impressionist and Modern Paintings and Sculpture department as a member of the small team that annually organizes some of the most important fine art auctions in the world. In addition to the responsibilities involved with researching and mounting these sales, she also assisted clients with building their collections and bid on their behalf. During those years, to satisfy her interest in the decorative arts as well as her creative side, she decided to try some evening  classes in interior design at Parsons. Excelling at this, she eventually left Christie’s to finish her degree and pursue a career in interior design.  

Her design experience was earned at the highest levels of industry, including NICO Construction Company, Inc., New York; Gensler and Associates/Architects, New York; Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum, PC, New York. Realizing that her broad training and experience as both an art and design historian and an interior designer would allow her to offer a unique and complimentary combination of professional  services, Terry launched Ryan Art and Design in 1992. By 1998, it was a full-time concern, with clients in the United States and Europe.  

In 2007, she decided to pursue a long-held goal: earning an MA in the history of design and the  decorative arts. In 2011, she graduated from the Parsons School of Design/ Cooper-Hewitt MA program,  with specialties in European interiors and European ceramics from 1850-1950. In addition to studies in Paris, France, and Florence, Italy, her course of study also included internships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Modern and Contemporary Art department, where she assisted with the research for  and mounting of the French Art Deco installation of 2008-9. 

Since completing her graduate studies, and while continuing her work as an interior designer, Terry has  taught various courses related to design history and theory at Parsons School of Design and the New  York School of Interior Design, in New York, and the Philadelphia University graduate school of interior  architecture. Since 2012, she has been teaching the History of Furniture and Interior Design at Kean University, Union, New Jersey; and in recent years, Elements and Principles Studio and Studio I. Since 2016, she has been teaching the History of Furniture and Interiors at Brookdale College, Lincroft, New Jersey, and more recently, Design Elements for Interior Design, as well as organizing the interior design summer study abroad programs. 

Terry and her husband, Tim, have lived in the same little brick row house in downtown Jersey City for over thirty years.