Art-loving couple enjoys the island life

Published 1:02 pm Monday, April 20, 2026

Michael Monroe’s eyes light up while saying that he’s always dreamed of living on an island.

For the last year or so, he and his wife, Bernadette, have resided at Island House senior living, which is situated in the 7800 block of Southeast 30th Street and located near Mercerdale Park, the post office and numerous shops that they can frequent.

Bernadette, 87, describes Island House as a positive, neighborly and caring place where people form bonds and share their life stories.

“I would say that this has a mirroring of what Mercer Island started out with a long time ago,” said Bernadette, adding that Island House sits in the midst of tons of activity and nature that’s accessible to them “which makes it very nice, very stimulating, very accommodating.”

Michael, 86, said when the couple — married for 55 years — moved from Bellevue into Island House, it was an ideal and beautiful match of a residence and community for the Monroes.

“Serendipity brought us together to have an experience. You get much more of a sense of community on an island than you do if you’re in a broader landscape. So there’s a real special feeling about Mercer Island,” he said.

Within the Island House walls, the couple can take advantage of lectures, musical performances and group game sessions and participate in town hall meetings. They can also grab a bus to visit places around the Island, check out the Frye Art Museum in Seattle and Eastside spots, and travel to their doctor appointments in Bellevue.

There’s a unity among the diverse group of residents, the staff members and the executive director at Island House, Michael said.

“We are here together. And that togetherness brings a richness of life experience, which is important to everybody,” he added.

While residents can eye the pieces on display at the Frye Art Museum, there’s art happening at Island House as well. Bernadette said a Girl Scout troop recently paid the residents a visit and they joined together in painting flowerpots and plants.

With brush in hand, Bernadette has also continued to bring her own watercolor paintings to life that she began doing years ago. While Michael — a former painter and museum executive director — doesn’t create art these days, he appreciates that Bernadette is carrying on her passion for the arts.

The Monroes met at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, after making their way to the school from their hometowns of Milwaukee (Bernadette) and Racine (Michael) in Wisconsin.

Bernadette taught art history and studio art for 30 years to mainly high-schoolers and some younger students. In the teaching realm, she found it rewarding to connect with students and try and help them come alive to what they could do and observe, she said.

Whether she’s engaged in painting, drawing or printmaking, Bernadette’s main source of inspiration to create has always come from poetry.

“I’m trying to portray the inner vitality, whether it be something I’m seeing in nature or something that I’ve read or an exchange with a person. It depends on the idea and where I want to take it,” she said. “It’s trying to pull out the essence of what your thoughts are, put it down so somebody else can take something from it.”

Michael was initially a teacher and museum director for the State University of New York at Oneonta, then advanced in his career to become a director for one of the 16 Smithsonian museums (his was focused on handmade furniture and jewelry, textiles, ceramics, glass blowing and more) in Washington, D.C., and gave Dale Chihuly his first one-person exhibition at a national museum to help launch his career. He later served as the executive director/chief curator of the Bellevue Art Museum for 20 years.

When asked what he’s learned over the years being involved in art that he can apply to everyday life, Michael replied: “I think as an artist, you deal with your own expression and dealing with what has happened in your own life, how that comes out and through the medium that you’re working in — oil and so forth. By doing so, you reach other people.”