Charles Rennie Mackintosh was born on June 7th 1868 to Margaret Rennie and William Mackintosh in Townhead, Glasgow. William tended a vegetable garden that was said to have inspired much of Mackintosh’s work, drawing his attention to growth and nature. When he was young, he developed a rheumatic fever, and this caused half of his face to droop which contributed to his appearance as one of his signature features. 

When the family moved to a new home Mackintosh used his greatly developing skills to adjust the interiors by remodelling their fireplace and adding friezes to the walls.

In 1877 mackintosh began studying architecture and technical drawing at Allan Glen's High School before attending the Glasgow School of Art for part time study between the ages of 15 -25. Whilst at the GSA he was interning for architect John Hutchinson and training as a painter under the Headmaster, Francis Newberry.

After the passing of his mother, Mackintosh went traveling through Europe where he spent a large amount of time in Italy. He studied the buildings there, rather avoiding the classical and focusing on the Romanesque, Byzantine, and Gothic structures.

Mackintosh returned to Glasgow and was offered a position at the architecture firm Honeyman and Keppie. From what we know, Mackintosh was engaged to John Keppie’s sister, Jessie Keppie, in 1981. He eventually broke the engagement and began his relationship with Margaret Macdonald in 1982.

In 1893 Mackintosh vocalised his feeling that artist and architects should be granted more artistic freedom at a public lecture on architecture. At this time, he was experimenting with a wide range of different mediums and artistic techniques such as painting, metal work and furniture designs. Later in his career when he was given full freedom with his “total work of art” concepts, we would see Mackintosh flourish, demonstrating his full scope of creativity.

Mackintosh received his largest commission to date – a new building for the Glasgow School of Art. Due to a lack of funding, this commission would be completed in two phases between 1897-99 and 1907-09, which was quite a positive set back. It meant that Mackintosh could refocus his design and apply new techniques to his design.

After his design work for the Glasgow School of Art was attributed to Keppie in 1897 he seemed understandably eager to branch out and run his own firm. However, Glasgow was not receptive of Mackintosh’s work and even his furniture design was not well received.  

When his work was seen in Europe it received high praise and predicted a better reception in Glasgow. It seems that throughout his career he was destined to receive better praise in Germany and Austria than his own home of Glasgow.

 

"I hope when brighter days come, I shall be able to work for myself entirely and claim my work as mine."

 

After he married Margaret in 1900 they moved to a flat at 120 Mains Street. Mackintosh quickly began to receive major commissions, where he designed Hill House as a home for Walter Blackie and was working on rooms of the tearooms belonging to Miss Catherine Cranston.

The Glasgow four were commissioned to design a room for the Vienna Secession in 1900. The result of their efforts captivated the Viennese public, with more than 20, 000 guests vying to catch a look at their highly praised work. Their Viennese contemporaries drew heavy inspiration from the Glasgow Style and vice versa.

In 1903 Mackintosh submitted plans for Miss Cranston’s proposed tearooms at 217 Sauchiehall Street and the building work began not long after.

In 1906 Mackintosh submitted his design for Scotland Street School, which would be his last public commission.

1909 saw Keppie once again wrongly credited for Mackintosh’s work on the Glasgow School of Art and this seems to mark a certain decline in Mackintosh’s patience with this art scene that was unwilling to accept of acknowledge him.

In 1916 Miss Cranston commissioned Mackintosh one last time to create a basement level tearoom in the adjoining building at 219 Sauchiehall Street. This tearoom could be entered through the Willow via a specifically inserted opening in the Front Saloon. From here, a staircase led down to the new tearoom which was known as The Dug Out – a reference to the trenches of WWI. 

The Mackintoshes would move to Walberswick in Suffolk in 1914 where they would stay until the summer of 1915. It was in 1915 that Mackintosh was wrongly arrested under suspicion of being a spy due to his night-time strolls along the beaches and illustrative commissions that were address to a German address. Mackintosh being a very proud character didn’t endear the police to his plight and eventually took him to the cells where Margaret had to exercise some social power to have him released.

Like many other examples of his work, the Dug Out was tragically destroyed in the late 1920s. It was Mackintosh’s last commission in Glasgow and provides a tantalising glimpse of what might have been had Mackintosh found another patron in London as supportive as Miss Cranston.

1917 saw the completion of his last architectural work, 78 Derngate which held many similarities with the Dug Out. Bright yellows, dark blues and triangular geometrical forms were big features.

There are no known photos of this space, and very limited drawings by which we can see how The Dug Out looked. What we do know is that it was completely different to anything Mackintosh had designed for Miss Cranston before. The ceilings were shiny and black with dark blue walls. Patterning of a geometric nature was a key decorative theme and flashes of bright yellow. This only adds to the rather mysterious nature of the Dug Out, as the whole space was eventually lost to time.

They moved to the south of France in 1920 where Mackintosh would produce some beautiful painting work before eventually returning to London due to his ill health in March 1927.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh died 10th December 1928 in London.