Background
Born in India, she was the daughter of Charles Edward Fraser Tytler of Balnain and Aldourie, but spent much of her youth in Scotland and settled in England in the 1860s.
Born in India, she was the daughter of Charles Edward Fraser Tytler of Balnain and Aldourie, but spent much of her youth in Scotland and settled in England in the 1860s.
Royal College of Artist
Trained at the Slade and South Kensington School of Art, she initially became known as a portrait painter, and was associated with Julia Margaret Cameron and the Freshwater community. She co-founded the Compton Potters" Arts Guild and the Arts & Crafts Guild in Compton, Surrey. She designed, built and maintained the in Compton (1895).
And had built and maintained the Watts Gallery (1903-1904) for the preservation of her husband"s work.
Tytler worked to create employment for impoverished people through the preservation of rural handicrafts, as well as trained workers in clay modelling for the Compton Potters" Guild and the work executed on the She was a firm believer in the idea that anyone given the opportunity could produce things of beauty and that everyone should have a craft within which they could express themselves creatively. She supported the revival of the Celtic style, the indigenous artistic expression of Scotland and Ireland.
In 1899, she was asked to design rugs in this style for the carpet company Alexander Morton & Company of Darvel, Liberty"s main producer of furnishing fabrics. In cooperation with the Congested Districts Board, Morton had established a workshop in Donegal, Ireland, to employ local women, who had very little opportunity of earning a livelihood.
Tytler pioneered Liberty"s Celtic style, with much of the imagery for the Celtic Revival carpets, book-bindings, metalwork and textiles for Liberty & Company being based on her earlier designs at the Tytler was President of the Godalming and District National Union of Women"s Suffrage Society and she convened at least one women"s suffrage meeting in Compton, Surrey.