Read, Reinhart

London; cabinet maker (fl.1895-6)

Read joined the Guild of Handicraft about 1895. He was called ‘Old Dick Read’ and was a radical trade unionist. A music cabinet, designed by C.R. Ashbee, executed by R. Read, was exhibited by the Guild and School of Handicraft at the Arts & Crafts Exhibition Society, London, 1896 (cat. no. 261).  

Sources: Lambourne, Utopian Craftsmen, (1980); Crawford, C R Ashbee. Architect, Designer & Romantic Socialist (1985);Carruthers and Greensted, Good Citizen’s Furniture, The Arts & Crafts Collections at Cheltenham (1994); Greensted, ‘The Arts and Crafts Movement collections at Cheltenham Art Gallery and Museum’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850-1932 (2000); Greensted and Wilson, Originality and Initiative.  The Arts and Crafts archives at Cheltenham (2003); Arts & Crafts Exhibition catalogues, 1888-1916.