Margrie, always keen to nurture the new – while respecting the established – turned the CAC into a craft hothouse. He discerningly focused on supporting makers with grants, advisory services, regional conferences and collecting work, while giving audiences the chance to appreciate new work and to engage with it critically in the pages of Crafts magazine, in exhibitions in the CC’s own central London gallery, across the UK and abroad, and in its shop at the V&A.
Margrie was also mindful of forging a nationwide collaborative infrastructure for crafts through regional arts associations and established craft societies. For a time, the conservation of craft was given resources, but Margrie leant more naturally towards grant-aiding opportunities for innovation; for example, in enabling glassblowing and ironwork to flourish in small-scale workshops rather than in industrial settings.
Margrie’s indefatigable enthusiasm and dedication, his knowledge, expectation of high standards and infectious laughter were all qualities that inspired his team. By 1984, when Margrie left with the honour of a CBE, he had created a sustainable Crafts Council which finally bridged the gap in the work of the Arts Council and Design Council and was admired by the crafts community internationally. Until the turn of the millennium, Margrie continued working as a visiting professor and external examiner in higher education and as a trustee and adviser for the V&A, the Gulbenkian Foundation and the British Council.