Ladderback chairs designed in 1903 by architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868–1928) for Glasgow Willow Tea-rooms came on the London market in 2014, and put me in mind of Glasgow businesswoman Kate Cranston (1849–1934).
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I like the description of Kate Cranston in Famous Scots. Born in the Victorian age when women were expected to be limited to the family home, Kate Cranston was fortunate to grow up in an entrepreneurial Glasgow family. Her father was a tea merchant and owned the Cranston's Hotel and Dining Rooms, her brother was a tea merchant and bought three small tearooms, and a cousin managed a hotel.
Tearooms became a feature of Glasgow in the second half of the C19th but Kate Cranston was to take the concept to new heights with high standards and innovative design. Initially tearooms had been established to encourage temperance in a society where alcohol abuse was wide spread. But by the last decades of Queen Victoria’s reign, tearooms were becoming valuable places for socialising and were frequented by men, and women if they were in company.
Glasgow held an International Exhibition in 1888 that would prove to be incredibly inspirational to the city’s architectural and artistic development. An enormous domed building was erected in Kelvingrove Park, surrounded by beautiful smaller structures of eastern design influence.
One of Kate's great achievements was to encourage the artistic talents of the Glasgow School designers. Early in Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s career (in 1896) the very experienced tearoom owner asked the young artist to design the wall murals of the new Buchanan St tearooms. The tearooms had been designed and built by one architect, with interiors and furnishings being designed by another. Mackintosh only had to design the Art Nouveau friezes.
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Kate Cranston understood that good design was a vital component in her success. And an ongoing component! Mackintosh returned to Ingram St a number of times, and in 1911 created the Chinese Room in a room that had been looking a bit tatty. The elegant Victorian and Edwardian ladies, who drank tea sitting on the unique high-backed Mackintosh furniture, certainly loved her tearooms. Mackintosh continued to work for Kate Cranston until 1917, designing the layout of the building and creating the furniture and décor for 21 happy years.
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Kate had an astute business sense but was eccentric. She dressed in old fashioned Victorian crinolines, long after they were out of fashion. In 1892 she married John Cochrane, a director of the Grahamston Foundry and Engine Works. After a very happy marriage, she naturally became very depressed when he died in 1917. There were no children. She immediately sold off her tearooms and wore black for the rest of her life. And when Kate died in 1934 at a good age, she bequeathed in her will two thirds of her estate to Glasgow’s shoeless families. Alas Charles Rennie Mackintosh had already died of cancer back in 1928, only 59 years old.
Kate Cranston c1900
Dressed like young Queen Victoria
National Portrait Gallery.
Tearooms became a feature of Glasgow in the second half of the C19th but Kate Cranston was to take the concept to new heights with high standards and innovative design. Initially tearooms had been established to encourage temperance in a society where alcohol abuse was wide spread. But by the last decades of Queen Victoria’s reign, tearooms were becoming valuable places for socialising and were frequented by men, and women if they were in company.
In 1878, Kate followed in her brother's footsteps and opened her own tearoom for the first time. Soon she was operating four Glasgow establishments very successfully - Argyle St, Buchanan St, Ingram St and Sauchiehall St. Precision and innovation! She provided some rooms exclusively for women; there were luncheon rooms where men and women could dine together; and there were smoking rooms and billiards rooms provided exclusively for men.
Glasgow held an International Exhibition in 1888 that would prove to be incredibly inspirational to the city’s architectural and artistic development. An enormous domed building was erected in Kelvingrove Park, surrounded by beautiful smaller structures of eastern design influence.
One of Kate's great achievements was to encourage the artistic talents of the Glasgow School designers. Early in Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s career (in 1896) the very experienced tearoom owner asked the young artist to design the wall murals of the new Buchanan St tearooms. The tearooms had been designed and built by one architect, with interiors and furnishings being designed by another. Mackintosh only had to design the Art Nouveau friezes.
Cranston must have liked what she saw. In 1898 Mackintosh’s next commission was to design the furniture and interiors for the existing Argyle St tearooms. Then in 1900 Miss Cranston commissioned him to redesign an entire room in her Ingram St tearooms. The Willow Tearoom in Sauchiehall St was the most famous of the Cranston-Macktinosh collaborations.
Willow Tearooms.
iconic chair design, by Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Web Gallery Art
Kate Cranston understood that good design was a vital component in her success. And an ongoing component! Mackintosh returned to Ingram St a number of times, and in 1911 created the Chinese Room in a room that had been looking a bit tatty. The elegant Victorian and Edwardian ladies, who drank tea sitting on the unique high-backed Mackintosh furniture, certainly loved her tearooms. Mackintosh continued to work for Kate Cranston until 1917, designing the layout of the building and creating the furniture and décor for 21 happy years.
Mackintosh designed an art nouveau frieze
at the top of the tearoom wall
dezeen
Mackintosh also designed the exterior
for the Willow Tea Rooms
Alamy
