Cranbrook Press Chair

This small chair was once one of a set of at least four similar chairs, originally placed in the rooms occupied by the Cranbrook Press at the Detroit Evening News. The spindle legs, square seat, and pattern of foliage carved into the back of this chair are based on European seventeenth-century examples.

George Booth established Cranbrook Press in emulation of William Morris’s Kelmscott Press, an Arts and Crafts press that revived medieval hand printing for the modern age. In 1900, a suite of attic rooms over the newspaper offices were redecorated in a manner evocative of a preindustrial workshop, with half-timbered walls, small-paned windows, and sturdy wooden furniture designed by George Booth. There, a small staff worked alongside George Booth to design, print, and bind new editions of classic works.

The Cranbrook Press remained in operation only from 1900 to 1902. However, both the presses themselves and much of the furniture from the original site eventually migrated to the Cranbrook Campus, where they saw new uses at both the Cranbrook Academy of Art and Kingswood School for Girls.

Mariam Hale
2023-2025 Collections Fellow
Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research
September 2024