IRVINGTON—Mary Lloyd Pollard Lay, 88, died peacefully on June 22, 2024, surrounded by family, after a brief illness. She was predeceased in 2011 by her beloved husband of 52 years, David Lay.
Mary Lloyd was born on February 21, 1936, in Washington, D.C., to John Garland Pollard Jr. and Margaret “Peggy” Clarkson Pollard. Mary Lloyd’s family moved to Lancaster County in 1942. She attended grade school in Lively and graduated from St. Margaret’s School in Tappahannock, where she later served on the Board of Governors. Mary Lloyd earned her bachelor’s from Hollins College and often spoke fondly of her year abroad in Paris, France.
As young parents, she and David renovated their historic brick colonial home while raising two children in Old Town Alexandria and spending summers at their cottage on Myers Creek in Lancaster County. In the late-1960s, the Lay family spent two wonderful years living in Tokyo, Japan, where Mary Lloyd’s love for all things Japanese—art, culture and flower arranging—was born. By the mid-1970s, they moved the family from Alexandria to the Northern Neck, where they built a home and created beautiful gardens in Weems. She founded and grew The Dandelion Shop in Irvington with her two partners.
Mary Lloyd and David were avid gardeners who raised beautiful azaleas, camellias and Japanese maples to adorn their woodland property along the Eastern Branch of the Corrotoman River. She loved designing and tending to her perennials beds and often said that plants are like furniture, so you must keep moving them around. Mary Lloyd loved entertaining and inviting friends to their home for dinner parties and to enjoy their beautiful gardens.
In 2009, she and David celebrated their golden wedding anniversary at Belle Isle State Park in the garden of her childhood home, Bel Air, where exactly 50 years earlier to the date, time and location, her parents had hosted their wedding reception.
Mary Lloyd was active in the Garden Club of the Northern Neck for many years. She transitioned from flower arranging to the horticulture and finance committees to serving as president and working on conservation projects. She also greatly enjoyed her time as a flower show judge. In 1997 she published Heaven in Zone 7, a gardening book detailing the trials and tribulations of gardening in the Upper South. She pledged all the book proceeds to grow an endowment fund for The Garden Club of the Northern Neck to benefit community projects and later received the Garden Club of Virginia Horticulture Award of Merit in 1998. She was thoughtful and insightful and always willing to consult with others on their garden ideas or put on her old clothes and dig in the dirt.
She was a founding member of the Just Gardens Tour for the benefit of The Haven. With good friends she helped start the Rappahannock Institute for Lifelong Learning (RILL) at Rappahannock Community College. They recruited retired friends and scholars to teach. Mary Lloyd truly lived her life as a lifelong learner and felt others should too. She was an avid reader and lover of books and actively participated in numerous book groups. Late in life, she took up and greatly enjoyed needlepoint and bridge.
Mary Lloyd is survived by her son, Mark Phillips Lay and daughter-in-law, Prentiss Lay; grandchildren, Caroline and Andrew Lay, who were the light of her life; daughter, Martha Poole Lay and son-in-law, Gary Race, and his son, Jeremy Race and wife, Debra; her brothers, John Garland Pollard III (Kathleen) and Albert Clarkson Pollard (Mary Louisa) and their families; her first cousin and dearest childhood friend, Peggy Clarkson Woodward and her family; and brother-in-law, Michael Lay and his family.
A Celebration of Life Service is planned for 11 a.m. Saturday, July 27, at St. Mary’s Whitechapel, Lively.
In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation in Mary Lloyd’s memory to “Garden Club of NNK Endowment Fund” and mail to: Emily Wilkinson, Treasurer – GCNN, 2296 Suggetts Point Road, Warsaw, VA 22572.
