By Sallie James
DELRAY BEACH — Delray Beach fashion designer Marjorie Scott Ott, a devoted mother and entrepreneur whose stylish line of resort wear garnered national attention, died on May 3 at home. She was 97.
Mrs. Ott created the Toby of Palm Beach line of clothing in the 1960s that was carried by upscale stores such as Neiman-Marcus, Bonwit Teller, Peck and Peck and Jane Spencer. The popular clothing line, initially sewn by local seamstresses in their Florida rooms, was eventually manufactured in Miami. When ultimately Saks Fifth Avenue picked up the line, it stipulated that no store within 50 miles of any Saks could carry the line, except for Jane Spencer of Delray Beach.
Despite Mrs. Ott’s fame as a fashion designer, her sons remember her as a humble optimist, a bold adventurer who loved to sail, a devoted mother and a lover of life who kept things in perspective with her heartfelt sense of humor.
“She was the sweetest, funniest, warmest person,” recalled her son Richard Tobias. “She was an art major and she was very creative. The designing thing sort of was a fluke. She had these shifts you could put on over your bathing suits — our grandmother liked it and she told Mom, who had a dressmaker, make one for my mother. My grandfather said this could be good business.”
Born on Oct. 4, 1921, in Queens, New York, Marjorie Scott attended Kew-Forest School, Skidmore College and the University of Arizona, graduating with a bachelor of fine arts degree in 1941 at age 19.
She worked as a draftswoman for American Export Airlines, plotting out its flying boat-conducted trans-Atlantic surveys. Her foray into fashion came when she became a senior stylist for Macy’s in Manhattan.
She married Richard Tobias Jr. in 1950 and lived with their three sons near Nyack, New York, until they decided to move to Palm Beach in 1957. But their journey there was somewhat unconventional: The family — with two dogs and three very young boys — cruised south on their 63-foot yacht until arriving in Florida, where they decided to stay.
“It was crazy. I was only 2 months old when they decided to come down to Florida by boat. My brother Scott was 2 and brother Richard was 5,” said her son Charles Tobias. “It was a big boat with one engine and we were in the ocean sometimes and in the Intracoastal Waterway sometimes.”
By November 1957 they’d had enough and decided to settle permanently in South Florida. The family lived in Palm Beach and then Delray Beach, where Mrs. Ott launched Toby of Palm Beach.
She created the apparel lines Toby Tanner and Marjorie Scott, both produced by Tanner of North Carolina, and designed a fashion line for David Crystal/Izod of New York, her sons said. She traveled often but was devoted to her family. She never lost her sense of humor.
The Tobiases divorced in the early 1970s. He died in 2005. She married Carl Ott in 1975; he died in 2004.
“My mother, in the most serious of times between my brothers and I, would look up at us and give us cross-eyes and try to make us laugh. She would give the hat off her head to anybody,” Charles Tobias recalled.
Her motto? “To thine own self be true,” from Shakespeare, Charles Tobias said.
Her son Richard Tobias, an artist, remembered what his mother did when she learned that one of his close friends was traveling to New York for the first time.
“Mom said to her, you have to have an LBD if you are going to New York — a little black dress. My mom gave her this little black cocktail dress and my friend said it made her trip worth it,” Richard Tobias recalled. “She was fun. She was so cool — she wanted to bring out the best in everyone.”
After retiring from the fashion industry in 1973, she purchased a knitting and needlework boutique in Delray Beach, purchased the historic Pittman House, which was later donated to the Delray Beach Historical Society’s historical village, and operated two other specialty shops in Delray for several years.
Her children said she remained sharp to the end.
“She was humble and she was funny, had a great sense of humor and just welcoming to people always,” Richard said.
Memorial services were pending.
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