Monthly Mood Board: Charles Rennie Mackintosh

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Charles Rennie Mackintosh mood board

Way back in 1990, I visited Glasgow the year it was European City of Culture. I took a National Coach from Brighton that arrived at dawn – it was a magical experience. There was such a buzz to the area – I’d never seen so many cranes on a skyline and building work going on! While I was there, I took myself on a little Charles Rennie Mackintosh tour of the city.

I visited The Mackintosh House at the Hunterian Art Gallery, the Scotland Street School, Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum gazed up at the Daily Record Building facade, had cake in the Willow Tea Rooms on Sauchiehall Street and took a magical train journey along the river Clyde out to The Hill House in Helensburgh.

Of all the places I visited on that trip, my favourite was the Glasgow School of Art. I was really upset when I saw images of it ablaze on the news last month. How do you replace all the fantastic wooden desks and panelling in the library? The glass in the windows of the top-floor studio? It’s such a shame, I hope it can be restored.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh is one of my favourite British architect/designers – and, to top it off, it was his birthday day before yesterday!

  1. ITC Rennie Mackintosh font: £29.75 each for light and bold, Linotype
  2. Glasgow School of Art: Charles Rennie Mackintosh (Architecture in Detail) by James Macaulay: from £26.38, Amazon
  3. Diploma of Honour designed for the Glasgow School of Art Club, 1894: from £14.95, easyart
  4. Art Nouveau Dado by Lincrusta: £146.99 per roll, Wallpaperdirect
  5. Stainless steel Mackintosh style house number plaque by housebling: £89, Notonthehighstreet
  6. Mackintosh rose antique stained glass window: £1424.31, eBay
  7. Dolls house miniature Charles Rennie Mackintosh tall rose boudoir chair, white: £47.15, Etsy
  8. Art deco papercut card pack (3 designs/cards): £9, Etsy

Tuesday Huesday: Stanley Spencer’s Shipbuilding

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panel from Stanley Spencer's Shipbuilding series of artworksStanley Spencer, Riveters, 1941 | © Imperial War Museum

Perhaps it was listening the recent BBC Radio 2 programme about one of my favourite songs – Elvis Costello & Clive Langer’s Shipbuilding that reminded me of one of my favourite artists – Stanley Spencer. He created beautiful works often on an epic scale about war, industry and religion.

Click on the image above to see a larger version.

If I’ve whetted your appetite for more there’s a great book entitled Men of the Clyde: Stanley Spencer’s Vision at Port Glasgow available on Amazon

Below is an introduction to it’s restoration and display at Chatham Historic Dockyard in 2010.