Now in her 90’s Emily Muir was born in Chicago and spent summers as a child on Deer Isle, Me.. She met her future husband, sculptor/painter William Muir, while attending the Art Students league in New York City eventually settling in Stonington, Me, her home now for over 60 years. At ninety-five Muir works daily in her studio turning out richly colored paintings of local boats and fishermen, modernist landscapes filled with the power of nature and light filled oils capturing the quiet moments of a simple life.

More than a painter Muir is also a self taught architect and winner of Design International’s Outstanding Achievement Award for the 46 houses she began designing in the Stonington area at the age of 60. Not content to just design, Muir was almost always on site while a house was being built. In many ways it is her "first love" or as she puts it: "you can criticize my paintings anytime, but not my houses!" As a writer she has published work of fiction (Small Potatoes, Charles Scribner and Sons, 1940) and is currently working on her autobiography.

Emily Muir’s oils and sculptures have been featured at Gallery-by-the-Sea almost since its inception. An 1999 exhibition at Gallery-by-the-Sea titled "Leo and Emily" featured Muir’s oils along with the watercolors of the late artist Leo Brooks.