Gentlemen only!

I hadn't ever noticed this unusual light fitting on my wanders through Kelvingrove, which doesn't say a lot for my powers of observation!

Miss Cranston opened her Ingram Street tea rooms in 1886 where she served tea imported from China by her brother Stuart. By 1911 her busy Gentleman's Tea Room required a revamp and Mackintosh was her designer. For inspiration he turned to the Orient and although the design concept was based on the square all the shapes in the room were taken from Chinese Art. So this light fitting and the domino table and chairs in the extra were once part of that.

At the other side of the gallery are tables and chairs from the Ladies Luncheon Rooms. If I were a late 19th century lady out to take tea with my female friends I would be wearing a long dress, possibly with a bustle at the back and my upright posture would be determined by my whalebone corset! Therefore, no chance of lounging about as in Costa Coffee today! Tables and straight backed chairs were the order of the day.

It would have been the same for the men, buttoned into woollen suits with waistcoats and stiff shirts with detachable starched collars, as they settled down in a cloud of smoke in their own tearoom, away from the frivolous chat of the ladies! The domino table had shelves for pipes, cigars and cards etc., so gentlemen could meet for a game and manly talk!!