Mackintosh at the Willow

During the mid-nineteenth century, the Cranston family were well known hoteliers, bakers, and pastry makers in Glasgow.  Stuart Cranston was also famed for being one of the city’s first tea merchants.   

Taking a ‘pure and simple’ approach, Stuart’s tea shops served bread and cake to accompany their tea.  Spotting an opportunity to build on this concept, his sister Kate opened several popular and fashionable Cranston Tea Rooms across the city – Mackintosh at the Willow being one of them. 

Selling affordable tea within luxurious spaces, Cranston’s Tea Rooms provided an alternative community space from local pubs, and quickly became the place to be. 

Uncommon at the time, Kate patronised local artists to design her tearooms with women-only spaces.  Visiting The Salon de Luxe, also known as ‘the Lady’s Room’, women met outside their family home without needing a chaperone.  Embracing their newly found independence, many of these women went on to support the women’s suffrage movement. 

You can still find the decorative schemes and architecture by Glasgow-born designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh, just as it was in 1903.