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Handicraft Guild

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Arts and Crafts-style hammered copper jardiniere flowerpot

A hand-formed and hand-finished Arts and Crafts-style hammered copper jardiniere flowerpot, c.1910. Bottom center is stamped "Handicraft Guild/Minneapolis."

At the turn of the twentieth century, Minneapolis became a national center for the arts movement known as Arts and Crafts. The city's Handicraft Guild led the way. Founded by women, the Handicraft Guild made the arts in Minneapolis more democratic and populist by offering classes like pottery and metalwork to artists and teachers.

The international Arts and Crafts movement revived interest in hand-made arts and crafts. It started in England in the middle of the nineteenth century as an alternative to tedious factory labor brought by the Industrial Revolution. The Arts and Crafts revival valued patience, cooperation, and self-knowledge, and in Minneapolis, it also valued populism and democratic access to the arts.

Minneapolis was one of the first cities in the United States to establish an arts and crafts organization: the Arts and Crafts Society, organized in 1899. Its founders built upon the accomplishments of an earlier group, the Chalk and Chisel Club, which had held Minneapolis's first arts and crafts exhibit in 1898 and generated local interest. The Arts and Crafts movement appealed primarily to women and men of European descent who were part of Minneapolis's emerging urban middle class.

Many recognized a need for schoolteachers to gain the skills necessary to teach crafts in public schools, but the MSFA did not have room to offer hands-on workshops. In the fall of 1904, eleven women founded the Handicraft Guild as a Nicollet Avenue showroom for local artists. Soon thereafter, the Guild began offering art classes and workshops for artists and teachers. Thus, the Guild provided more opportunities to those interested in the handicrafts—crafts made by hand with a fine arts sensibility.

The Guild was officially incorporated in 1905. That year, it organized its first of many successful summer school courses. The 1905 summer course was managed by Mary Linton Bookwalter, an interior designer. It was taught and directed by Ernest Batchelder. Batchelder was a renowned tile maker, and his style was marked by beautiful form, rich colors, and few embellishments. Although he left the Guild in 1909, his aesthetic continued to influence the art made by Handicraft Guild members.

As the Guild grew, it required larger spaces. After a stay on Second Avenue in Minneapolis, the Guild moved in 1907 to a new building designed by William Channing Whitney and decorated by Guild members. With the move, the Guild became a center of artistic activity in Minneapolis. The new building at 89-91 Tenth Street South had workshops where artists could improve their methods and design; classrooms and other teaching spaces; studios for individual artists; a showroom; and a large assembly hall that hosted lectures and special exhibits.

In 1918, the Handicraft Guild determined that it was too difficult to manage both the Guild's building and its art education programs. The Guild was dissolved and absorbed by the new Art Education department at the University of Minnesota. Ruth Raymond, the last president of the Guild, became the chair of the department. She held that position until her retirement thirty years later. The Guild's building continued to be used by artists for many years after the Guild moved to the University of Minnesota. In 1998, it was designated an Individual Landmark by the Minneapolis Heritage Preservation Commission.

The Handicraft Guild no longer exists, but it has had lasting effects on the arts and cultural landscape. Many houses still have fireplaces, tiles, and other design elements that were created by Guild members in the early twentieth century. Internationally acclaimed Minnesota artist Henrietta Barclay Paist developed a more modern style when she studied with the Handicraft Guild, and painters like Grant Wood were influenced by the Guild's work.

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© Minnesota Historical Society
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Anderson, Marcia Gail. "The Handicraft Guild of Minneapolis: A Model of the Arts and Crafts Movement." In Substance of Style: Perspectives on the American Arts and Crafts Movement, edited by Bert Denker. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1996.

Conforti, Michael, ed. Art and Life on the Upper Mississippi, 1890–1915. Newark, DE: University of Delaware Press, 1994. Editor's Note: See especially Marcia G. Anderson, "Art for Life's Sake: The Handicraft Guild of Minneapolis," 122–150; Appendix 1: Biographies of Prominent Members of the Handicraft Guild of Minneapolis; and Thomas O'Sullivan, "Robert Koehler and Painting in Minnesota, 1890-1915," 93–121.

M2134
Chant, Elisabeth A. "The Handicraft Guild." The Bellman (March 21, 1908): 317–19.

Minneapolis Institute of Arts. About the Museum.
http://new.artsmia.org/about/

"Summer School Handicraft Guild." The Craftsman 8, no. 2 (May 1905): 266–67.

"Society Biographies: The Handicraft Guild, Minneapolis." Handicraft no. 3 (December 1910): 341–42.

Related Images

Arts and Crafts-style hammered copper jardiniere flowerpot
Arts and Crafts-style hammered copper jardiniere flowerpot
Junior Class at Handicraft Guild
Junior Class at Handicraft Guild
Glazed earthenware bookend
Glazed earthenware bookend
Arts and Crafts style copper spoon
Arts and Crafts style copper spoon
Handicraft Guild, 89 South Tenth, Minneapolis
Handicraft Guild, 89 South Tenth, Minneapolis
Assembly Room of Handicraft Guild, Tenth Street
Assembly Room of Handicraft Guild, Tenth Street
Unfinished watercolor and pencil study for a poster
Unfinished watercolor and pencil study for a poster
Weber Werness Studios in the Handicraft Guild Building, Tenth Street
Weber Werness Studios in the Handicraft Guild Building, Tenth Street

Turning Point

In 1907, the Handicraft Guild moves into a three-story building near Nicollet Avenue. The move establishes the growing organization as a center of art and art education in Minneapolis.

Chronology

1898

Members of the Chalk and Chisel Club, a group founded by women artists interested in wood carving, organize Minnesota's first arts and crafts exhibit at the Beard Art Gallery in Minneapolis.

1899

The Arts and Crafts Society is founded in Minneapolis. It is one of the first arts and crafts organizations in the nation.

1904

The Handicraft Guild is founded by primarily women artists, including Grace Margaret Kiess, the organization's first president.

1905

The Handicraft Guild is officially incorporated on April 25 and offers its first summer school design course from June 19 to July 19.

1907

The Guild moves to a new location that is large enough to accommodate workshops, private studios, a showroom, and a space for public events.

1909

Ernest Batchelder, original director of the Guild's summer school course, leaves to establish his own school in California, but his artistic influence in Minneapolis continues.

1918

The Handicraft Guild is dissolved and absorbed by a new Art Education department at the University of Minnesota. Guild president Ruth Raymond presides over the move and remains head of the department until her retirement thirty years later.

1998

The Handicraft Guild's building at 89-91 Tenth Street South is designated an Individual Landmark by the Minneapolis Heritage Preservation Commission.