Christine Herter studied art in New York and in Paris before enrolling at Yale University, from which she earned a BA in 1915. Among her Yale instructors was painter William Sergeant Kendall, with whom she began a romantic relationship.[3] In 1921, Kendall divorced his wife, painter Margaret Weston Stickney, and left his three daughters.[3] He resigned his position at Yale, and married Herter in 1922.[4] In 1923, the couple purchased a 114-acre mountainside property in Bath County, Virginia. There they built a large house (completed 1924), with an artist's studio at each end, and named it Garth Newel ("New Hearth"). They raised Arabian horses on the farm, and hosted concerts and art events.[5]
Her husband died in 1938, and she remained active in the local community, cofounding the Bath County Regional Art Show in 1964. With members of the Rowe String Quartet she established the Garth Newel Music Center in 1973. She bequeathed the house to the music center upon her death.[6]