- Celebrate the English and American Arts and Crafts Movement
- Connect with Two Cranbrooks, the Cranbrook our founding family created in Bloomfield Hills, and their ancestral home in Kent England
- Enjoy a Garden Gala at the Historic Cranbrook House
- Support Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research, including Cranbrook Archives
House Party 2023 Co-Chairs
- Bobbi and Stephen Polk and Ryan Polk
Special Guests
- Nick Addyman, Past Foundation Governor, Cranbrook School, Kent, England, and 1985-1986 Cranbrook Schools Michigan/Cranbrook School Kent Exchange Student
- Iris Eichenberg, Artist-in-Residence and Head of the Metalsmithing Department, Cranbrook Academy of Art
Get ready for a global celebration like none other: A House Party at Two Cranbrooks! The Cranbrook Center’s gala fundraiser will explore the story of the British-American Arts and Crafts Movement, and how it led to the creation of Cranbrook Educational Community.
The story begins almost 200 years ago in Cranbrook, a small market town in Kent England, where generations of Booths had worked as coppersmiths; it gathers momentum as the family immigrates to North America in 1844, eventually landing in Toronto, the birthplace of Cranbrook co-founder George Gough Booth; and the story flowers in Detroit, where George Gough Booth arrives as an ironworker, marries Ellen Scripps, and eventually secures the families’ fortunes as a newspaper publisher.
Just as George Gough Booth and Ellen Scripps Booth were inspired by their English roots and passion for handicrafts in the early 1900s, A House Party will lean into English culture through stories, objects, art, food, entertainment, and pageantry for a magical evening celebrating Two Cranbrooks.
Program
Location: Cranbrook House and the Gardens surrounding the Booth Family Manor
5:45pm English Prelude Performance presented in partnership with
St. Dunstan’s Theatre Guild of Cranbrook
In the Greek Theatre (Special Sponsors-Only Event)
6:30pm House Party Begins
Cocktail Tours of Cranbrook House
Arts and Crafts Demonstrations
English-inspired Entertainment and Activities
7:45pm Dinner on the West Terrace along the Reflecting Pool
Short Film Interlude: Two Cranbrooks, Two Kettles
8:45pm Dessert
Live Auction Program
9:45pm The Party Continues under the Tent and in the Gardens
10:30pm House Party Concludes
In the mid-1830s, George Booth’s grandfather, Henry Gough Booth, made a teakettle at the local copper shop on Stone Street. Members of the Booth family had been coppersmiths in the English village of Cranbrook for generations. That changed in 1844 when the family, following economic opportunity, moved to North America. In 1901, George Booth returned to England to trace his roots. He purchased the copper kettle as an example of his family’s history, and soon gave it pride of place at the family’s new estate in Bloomfield Hills: Cranbrook.
The Arts and Crafts Movement began in Britain in the late 19th century as a way of rethinking how to create and value art, architecture, and objects. Industrialization was radically changing everyday life, and artists and craftspeople responded by celebrating the construction of objects with more integrity, made by hand for decoration and practicality. The movement became a global phenomenon and flourished in Detroit with George Booth at the forefront.
Just as the Booth copper kettle traversed the Atlantic in 1901, connecting a family across time and two countries, our gala will also travel between two Cranbrooks. Join Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research as we learn more about our founding family and celebrate the role the Booths played in manifesting and defining the Arts and Crafts Movement in America. It’s a story that continues to inspire contemporary makers in the 21st century!
Your support of House Party 2023 adds to Cranbrook’s documentation of the Booth family story and advances the Center’s mission of collections interpretation and stewardship to increase awareness of—and access to—the diverse art, architecture, landscape, design, and historical resources that comprise the Cranbrook legacy.
To purchase a Host Committee, Patron, or Sponsor package and learn more about sponsor benefits, click below. Most sponsor packages include tickets to the celebration on the grounds of Cranbrook House on May 20, 2023.
Individual tickets, based on availability, will be sold for House Party 2023 beginning on April 1.
If you have questions, please call the Center at 248.645.3307.
Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research gratefully acknowledges our most generous patrons of A House Party at Two Cranbrooks.
We will be updating the Donor Wall weekly – and hope to include your name soon!
Learn more about the ancestral home of the Booth family with Center Curator Kevin Adkisson.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
For more information about the Center’s 2023 fundraiser, A House Party at Two Cranbrooks, please contact Center Director of Development Anna Mrdeza at AMrdeza@cranbrook.edu or by phone at 248.645.3215.
PHOTO CREDITS:
Unless otherwise noted, all color photography was photographed by Eric Perry in Cranbrook House, December 2022.
OBJECT CREDITS:
Unless otherwise noted, objects are part of the Cultural Properties Collection – Founders Collection, Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research, Bequest of George Gough Booth and Ellen Scripps Booth.
Banner Image: House Party 2023 Logo Border, Designed by Ed Ryan, CAA '22.
“Horse and Rider” Stained Glass Panel, circa 1525, Unknown Flemish Glazier.
Copper Teakettle Made in the Workshop of Henry Gough Booth (1838 – 1919), Cranbrook, Kent, England, circa 1838. In the background is a photograph of the copper shop of Henry Gough Booth in Cranbrook, Kent, England.
House Party 2023 Vertical Logo, Designed by Ed Ryan, CAA '22.
Handwoven Gothic-style Tapestry, 1911, Herter Looms, Inc. (Maker). Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum, Gift of George Gough Booth and Ellen Scripps Booth.
View of a Rainbow over the Union Mill in Cranbrook, Kent, England, circa 1901. Photograph by E.D. Evernden, Courtesy of Cranbrook Archives, Cranbrook Center for Collections and Research.
Booth Family Dining Table, Featuring Amethyst Cut Glass Stemware, circa 1925, Stevens & Williams (Maker).
Sponsor Packages: French Art Deco Vase, before 1929, Odette Chatrousse Heiligenstein (Maker). Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum.
Individual Tickets: Detail of Savonarola Chair, circa 1916, Johannes (John) Kirchmayer (Maker), Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts (Supplier).
Donor Wall: Detail of Wrought Iron Floor Lamp, 1922, Edward F. Caldwell & Co. (Maker).
Business Partner Wall: Intertwined Serpents Candle Holder, 1902-1919, Tiffany Studios (Maker). Inkwell, Late 19th-century, Edward F. Caldwell & Co. (Attributed). Bust of Edgar Allen Poe, 1898, George Julian Zolnay (Sculptor). Writing Desk, 1900-1935, Hayden Company (Maker).
Auction Items: Detail of a Handwoven Gothic-style Tapestry, 1911, Herter Looms, Inc. (Maker). Collection of Cranbrook Art Museum, Gift of George Gough Booth and Ellen Scripps Booth.
Virtual Tour: Bronze bookends, 1900-1935, maker unknown. The text on the side is from Scottish poet John Wilson, “For a jollie good booke whereon to looke is better to me than golde.”
House Party 2023 Square Logo, Designed by Ed Ryan, CAA '22.