19 September 2025 (18:00 - 19:00) In 2025 The National Trust for Scotland is partnering with Glasgow Doors Open Days to raise awareness of Mackintosh Illuminated. The National Trust for Scotland was awarded a significant award from the National Lottery Heritage Fund earlier this year to develop and bring to life a project which will raise the profile and understanding of two its most important 20th Century properties - both designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The Hill House in Helensburgh, built for the book publisher Walter Blackie, and Mackintosh at the Willow Tea Rooms on Sauchiehall Street, designed for Edwardian entrepreneur Miss Kate Cranston, will be the subjects of a deep dive into their history, construction and influence together with a major conservation project which seeks to repair the decades long leaking cement at his finest and largest residential building. The project entitled 'Mackintosh Illuminated' will also explore the influence of Mackintosh's wife Margaret Macdonald on the design, especially of the interiors of these buildings and their work in general. Liz Davidson, NTS Project Director will deliver a lecture on the aims of the project, its challenges and the opportunities it provides to put Mackintosh firmly at the top of the list of the UK's most important architects and designers. This lecture is suitable for anyone interested particularly in the built heritage, conservation and the City's role at the turn of the 19th Century in creating designs of exceptional beauty and international acclaim. If you are unable to attend, please refund your tickets so that someone else can attend. To enquire further please contact obraid@nts.org.uk or telephone 0141 204 1903. Mackintosh Illuminated Project Overview In December 2024, The National Lottery Heritage Fund awarded a generous £1.1 million package of development funding for Mackintosh Illuminated, a project that will spotlight Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Margaret Macdonald, sharing, celebrating, and inspiring as many as possible with their creative genius and the beauty of their creations. The project will help make Mackintosh and Macdonald better known and appreciated, internationally and at home, by creating an online learning resource and an expanded programme of property-based community and education work in Helensburgh and Glasgow. The project also encourages more people to visit both sites to get a richer picture of the pair’s skill and versatility. By working in partnership with other Mackintosh stakeholders in Glasgow and more widely, this support will aid in organising celebrations for the 2028 anniversary of Mackintosh’s death and the 160th anniversary of his birth. The funding is also enabling the Trust to continue the vital conservation work at the Hill House, including the full removal of the current render, to find a replacement material which will resolve the longstanding damp issue, remove the Box in 2028 and provide updated, permanent visitor facilities, including a café, shop and toilet facilities at the site on Upper Colquhoun Street in Helensburgh. Liz Davidson Biography Liz Davidson is currently Project Director of Mackintosh Illuminated the National Trust for Scotland's foremost capital initiative that seeks to widen and deepen appreciation of the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his artist partner Margaret Macdonald. In addition to new exploration into their lives and work and those of their extraordinary patrons such as Miss Cranston at the tea rooms, Mackintosh Illuminated will involve the comprehensive repair and restoration of his finest domestic commission - the Hill House in Helensburgh, Argyll. Liz is Chair of Glasgow Building Preservation Trust, and has served as a trustee on the Architectural Heritage Fund and the UK Association of Preservation Trusts (now Heritage Trust Network) as well as the Scottish Committee of the National Lottery Heritage Fund. Previously Liz has been Director of the Merchant City Townscape Initiative, and Head of Conservation and Design at Glasgow City Council in addition to being Senir Project Manager at the Mackintosh Building at Glasgow School of Art after their first fire in 2014. Whilst Director of Glasgow Building Preservation Trust Liz was responsible to establishing Doors Open day - at its time the first city in the UK to host the event. Limited spaces available in the surrounding streets – public transport encouraged Some Blue Badge parking available – contact the ARC for further information. All microphones in the building work in conjunction with an infrared hard of hearing system. There is also bike parking at the Advanced Research Centre (ARC). Water bottle refill stations For queries on accessibility at the ARC, please contact us on ARCEnquiries@glasgow.ac.uk or call our reception on +44 (0)141 330 4170.

Address
GDODF Festival Hub, Advanced Research Centre, 11 Chapel Lane, Glasgow, G11 6EW