Dundee's new £80m V&A museum will pay homage to one of Glasgow's most famous sons - Charles Rennie Mackintosh, its director has revealed.

 

A day after construction work begun on the controversial new museum, Phillip Long said that the legacy and influence of Mackintosh would be a key part of the dramatic building's collections.

Although the museum will attempt to entice tens of thousands of visitors will a constant stream of touring exhibitions, the museum, designed by Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, will have a permanent show of between 250 and 300 objects.

Many of these will be drawn from the 17,000 Scottish works in the V&A collections in London, but others will come from Scottish collections, loans and public lenders.

Mackintosh, considered both one of Scotland's finest architects and designers, will form a key part of this, Mr Long said.

He said the museum - the budget of which has ballooned to £80m from £49m - is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2017 and the museum is expected to open to the public by June 2018.

Mr Long said: "Charles Rennie Mackintosh is an essential figure and a pivotal designer and and we also want to find a way of showing his influence on a generation of other designers across Europe and the world.

"We are looking very closely at his work and his story.

"He made an extraordinary contribution to the story of Scottish design."

The permanent collection will include pieces from more than 500 years of history, to the present day.

These will include objects as small as china pieces and as big as a car or a room.

Every year will see a major "blockbuster" summer event, often touring art and design shows which are visiting major institutions elsewhere.

In London, senior curator Ghislaine Wood, based at the V&A in London, has been working on the contents of the Scottish Design Galleries.

The earliest object will date from the late 15th century, a Medieval Book of Hours, or devotional book, made in France, but commissioned by a Scottish patron.

Donald Brothers of Dundee, textile makers, will be represented from a collection of more than 150 pieces of hessian.

A McKenzie tartan dress from the 1850s will be exhibited in the 600 square metre exhibition space for Scottish design, made from Lyon silk in France.

A silver box made by Phoebe Anna Traquair, from her own collection and not seen in public before, will be on show, dating from 1928.

A large cabinet made by Bruce James Talbert from the 1860s will be exhibited, as well as a Hebridean Carpet designed by George Bain, a key figure in the Celtic revival, made for a house in Kidderminster in the 1940s.

The content of the displays in the galleries is currently still being developed, but will include designers, engineers and artists such as Phoebe Anna Traquair, Mackintosh, ­Edinburgh Weavers, Sir Basil Spence, Holly Fulton and ­Alexander McQueen.

This week Kuma visited Dundee for a ground-breaking ceremony along with Culture Secretary Fiona Hyslop and representatives of V&A Dundee, Dundee City Council and BAM Construction.

Mackintosh, born in Glasgow in 1868, designed the Glasgow Herald Building (1894) and the Martyr's Public School (1895) as well as the Glasgow School of Art, which was constructed in two phases, 1897-99 and 1907-09.

Most dramatic of all the interiors was the new Library, which was destroyed in a fire last year.

He alsodesigned The Hill House in Helensburgh (1904) and Windyhill (1900).

The Glasgow businesswoman Catherine (Kate) Cranston was an important patron and he designed a series of tearooms interiors between 1896-1917.