THE woman who rescued the last remaining Charles Rennie Mackintosh tea room is stepping down from the helm of the Trust she founded to save the Glasgow masterpiece.
Businesswoman Celia Sinclair, who led the multi-million pound redevelopment of the original Miss Cranston’s tea rooms on Sauchiehall Street, will be succeeded by former lawyer and Beatson Cancer Charity founding director Ian Dickson.
Celia bought the famous building at 217 Sauchiehall Street, known widely and affectionately as the Willow Tea Rooms, when she heard it was in trouble.
“I knew if it went to auction, it would be a disaster – everything would be stripped out and sold off, perhaps disappearing out of Glasgow and we would lose it all forever,” she said at the time. “I’m just an ordinary Glasgow citizen, but I couldn’t let that happen.”
Celia set up The Willow Tea Rooms Trust in to preserve the building for all time for the people of Glasgow and Scotland, adding education facilities, an interactive exhibition and a roof terrace. It opened its doors as Mackintosh at the Willow on on June 7, 2018, the 150th anniversary of Mackintosh’s birth. The Duke and Duchess of Rothesay visited three months later for the official Royal opening.
Celia will become Founder Patron of the Trust on February 1.
READ MORE: Meet the pioneering woman breathing life into famous Mackintosh tea rooms
“It is a privilege to be part of such an important part of Glasgow’s, and Scotland’s, cultural history,” she said. “Not only is it the only original Mackintosh-designed building in the city to function as originally intended, but Mackintosh at the Willow offers a unique connection to three of Scotland’s most pioneering citizens: Charles Rennie Mackintosh, his artist wife Margaret Macdonald, and the trailblazing female entrepreneur, Catherine Cranston. I remain committed to encouraging and enabling as many people as possible to enjoy this jewel in Glasgow and Scotland’s rich historical and architectural landscape.”
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