INTRODUCTION

The disappearance and possiblerecovery of early sketches by CharlesRennie Mackintosh (1868-1928) have, from time to time, exercised scholars.1

The decline in his reputation from 1914, when he abandoned a career in Glasgow and permanently left Scotland, resulted in the loss and destruction of much of Mackintosh’s work. Undocumented early works, particularly those on paper, were inevitably the most vulnerable.