GLASGOW CULTURE and the V & A

The aspirations of the new V & A in Dundee to be a centre of international, indeed global  importance were surely enhanced by the recent announcement that there would be an example of Glasgow's culture in a model of Miss Cranston's Tea room designed by Charles Rennie MacIntosh.  The institution of the tea room in Sauchiehall Street as a venue for social intercourse for the ladies of the west end dates back to those heady days when Glasgow was the Second City of the Empire.

 

The tea room will be an important exhibit.  I hope however that alongside the tea room there might be another Glaswegian exhibit, The Steamie, which is of no lesser significance.  Even in those vibrant days, at the height of her economic power, there was another side to Glasgow, the largely impoverished east end.  If Miss Cranston's tea room was the venue for the 'ladies' of the west end, social intercourse for the 'women' of the east end was The Steamie.  So come on you directors of the V & A, get yourselves a Steamie!