While a young architectural apprentice, Charles Rennie
Mackintosh, the son of a Glasgow policeman, attended evening
classes at the Glasgow School of Art, where he met Herbert
MacNair, Frances Macdonald, and her sister Margaret Macdonald
(who would later become Mackintosh's wife). Together they formed
"The Four," producing watercolors, poster designs, and small
decorative objects that were published in "The Studio." In 1889
Mackintosh was hired as a draftsman at the architectural firm of
Honeyman and Keppie, where he would remain until 1914. It was
there that he developed a unique design idiom based on the forms
and materials of traditional Scottish architecture. Mackintosh
undertook all aspects of a design commission, providing every
element, from an architectural setting to small decorative
objects and textiles. His best-known commissions include a
building for the Glasgow School of Art (built in two phases,
1897–99 and 1907–09) and Hill House (1902–04), the Walter
Blackie residence in the Glasgow suburb of