Rolling out the red carpet at Glanmore

By Joseph Quigley

BELLEVILLE – Glanmore National Historic Site has received $75,000 from a donation to create a custom reproduction of its original 19th Century carpet.

The project will replace the carpeting so it will look like it did to its original 1880s state. Working from historic photographs and a sample of the original removed in the 1970s, the carpet will be recreated by the original manufacturer, Wilton Carpet, England.

The current carpet was installed in 1972 when Glanmore House opened as a museum, but is now in need of replacement. Glanmore Curator Rona Rustige has been working to ensure the new carpet will be historically accurate as it can be.

“(The carpet) should have a good, long life ahead,” said Rustige.

Belleville City Council approved the $77,633 pre-capital budget at Monday’s council meeting. The majority of the cost will be covered by a $75,000 grant received by Glanmore from the John M. and Bernice Parrott Foundation. The rest of the cost will come from the museum’s reserve fund.

Rustige said that the Parrott Foundation’s donation was crucial to the project.

“I certainly wouldn’t have asked city council to pay for that,” said Rustige. “The only reason that we are getting this carpet done is because I made an application to the Parrott Foundation for this specific project and they were wonderful enough to fund it.”

The production and installation of the carpet will take up to a year to complete.