New Mackintosh Furniture Gallery

New furniture galleryThe Archives and Collections and GSA Enterprises are pleased to announced that The Glasgow School of Art has put some of its Mackintosh furniture back on display in a new gallery in the School’s Reid Building. The pieces, which were previously on show in the Mackintosh Room and furniture gallery in the east wing of in the Mackintosh Building, were saved from the fire which happened in May last year, and have been in storage for the last seven months.

20 pieces, including chairs from various Mackintosh commissions, an early repoussé-decorated linen press, a kimono-shaped bookcase from Windyhill, a master and slave clock from GSA and two rarely seen embroidered panels by Margaret Macdonald, will be on display in a gallery which the public will be able to visit as part of an organised tour led by one of the GSA’s student guides. You can find detailed information about all the pieces of Mackintosh Furniture in the School’s collections online and these records include images of both Mackintosh’s furniture and his works on paper.

ClockAmong the works on show in the new gallery are the master and one of the slave clocks from the innovative system which was installed in the Mackintosh Building in 1910. Regrettably, a number of the slave clocks were lost in the in the fire last May, but the majority were saved including examples in both the east and west wings of the building. Specialist horologist Nick Sanders will re-connect the master with one of the slaves so that visitors can see how the system, which was ground-breaking in its time, worked.

Embroidered panels, by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, c1902-1904
Embroidered panels, by Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, c1902-1904

Visitors will be also able to see two embroidered panels by Mackintosh’s wife, Margaret Macdonald, which are rarely exhibited. The last time they were on public display was when they were loaned out for the Klimt exhibition in Japan in 2012.

A visit to the furniture gallery will be included in the GSA’s Mackintosh tours from 1 February 2015. The tours, priced £9.75 (with a range of concessions) are led by student guides and take place at 11am, 1pm and 3pm in February with 10am and 4pm tours added in March. Tours depart half hourly over the summer. For further information and to book a tour visit: www.gsa.ac.uk/visit-gsa/mackintosh-at-the-gsa-tour/timetables-tickets

Meanwhile any member of GSA staff can book time in the gallery to support their own research or to take groups of students to view the furniture as part of a programme of teaching. Information on how to book the gallery is available on the Archives and Collection website.