Ingram Street Tea-Rooms

Detail of the Chinese room (re-created for an exhibit) (original photo by Dr. Thomas Howarth); Miss Cranston's Tearooms on Ingram Street continued in use as catering facilities from 1930 for Cooper's & Co., then in 1950 the rooms came into the ownership of Glasgow City Council and were used for storage and a souvenir shop. In 1971 the furnishings were removed into storage when the building was demolished, and they are now the only original set of Mackintosh tearoom interiors to survive. Ownership was transferred to Glasgow Museums in 1978, and after a further period of storage restoration work began in 1993. The Ladies' Luncheon Room was exhibited three years later, and the Chinese Room and Cloister Room have since been restored. The Glasgow Museums website reports that they are "currently assessing what will be needed to research and preserve the Charles Rennie Mackintosh interiors of the Ingram Street Tearooms for future public display." [Wikipedia] "The best-known Mackintosh interiors were those created for Miss Catherine Cranston's four tea-rooms in Glasgow: Buchanan Street (1896), Argyle Street (1897), Ingram Street (1900) and the Willow (1903), of which only the last-mentioned survives at 199 Sauchiehall Street. At this time tea-rooms in the city were numerous and popular; when hung with paintings by the Glasgow Boys some of them became almost like art galleries. None could match the tea-rooms of Miss Cranston with their startling decorations and the provision of such amenities as billiard-rooms and ladies' rooms." Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.groveart.com/ (accessed 1/27/2008