{{Short description|British costume designer (1857–1901)}} '''Patience Glossop Harris''' (1857 – December 1901), was a British costume designer for the theatre best known for her work with the actor Ellen Terry early in her career.
==Biography== Patience Glossop Harris was the daughter of Augustus Glossop Harris, an actor and theatre manager, and Maria Ann ({{nee}} Bone) Harris, a theatrical costumier.<ref name=glasgow/> She had two sisters, Ellen (Nelly) and Maria, and two brothers, Charles and Augustus, an actor and theatrical manager.<ref name=glasgow/><ref name=isaac/>
Harris oversaw the actress Ellen Terry's costumes during the first decade of Terry's career at the Lyceum Theatre, from the late 1870s to the late 1880s<ref name=isaac/> During this period Harris designed elaborate, heavy costumes in luxurious fabrics for ''Romeo and Juliet'', ''The Merchant of Venice'', and ''Much Ado About Nothing'', among other plays.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|289–94}} In 1882 Terry brought the costume designer Alice Comyns Carr on board as a consultant.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|304}} Harris and Carr worked together until 1887, but their tastes differed, with Carr favouring simpler, more flowing designs in the Aesthetic dress style.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|304–307}} Their disagreements reached a head in 1887 over designs for the plays ''Henry VIII'' and ''The Amber Heart'', and Harris resigned.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|304}}<ref name=vam/> Carr succeeded her as Terry's head costume designer.<ref name=vam/><ref name=cc1926/>
Harris's mother operated her costume business under the name "Madame Auguste" and supplied costumes to, among others, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in the 1880s.<ref>Theatre programmes, Savoy Theatre, London, for ''Patience'' (1881), ''Iolanthe'' (1882), ''Princess Ida'' (1884), ''The Mikado'' (1885) and ''Ruddygore'' (1887)</ref> Under the same name, Harris supplied costumes to D'Oyly Carte for seven productions from 1892 to 2001.<ref>Theatre programmes, Savoy Theatre, London, for ''Haddon Hall'' (1892), ''Utopia, Limited'' (1893), ''The Chieftain'' (1895), ''The Grand Duke'' (1896), ''H.M.S. Pinafore'' (revival 1899), ''The Rose of Persia'' (1899) and ''The Emerald Isle'' (1901)</ref>
At the time of her death she was working under the company name Auguste et Cie.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|288}} Costumes bearing this label were worn by both Terry and the actor–manager Henry Irving.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|288}}
The circumstances of Harris's death provoked an inquest, and it was suggested that she may have died of alcoholism.<ref name=isaac/>{{rp|288}}<ref name=dt1901/>
==References== <references>
<ref name=cc1926>Comyns Carr, Mrs. J. (Alice Comyns Carr). ''Mrs. J. Comyns Carr's 'Reminiscences' ''. London: Hutchinson, 1926.</ref>
<ref name=dt1901>"Death of Miss Patience Glossop Harris". ''The Derbyshire Times'', 4 January 1902.</ref>
<ref name=vam>[http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/t/the-actor-and-the-maker-ellen-terry-and-alice-comyns-carr/ "The Actor and the Maker: Ellen Terry and Alice Comyns-Carr"]. Victoria and Albert Museum website.</ref>
<ref name=glasgow>[http://www.whistler.arts.gla.ac.uk/correspondence/people/biog/?bid=Harr_A4 "Augustus Henry Glossop Harris, 1852-1896"] ''The Correspondence of James MacNeill Whistler'', University of Glasgow.</ref>
<ref name=isaac>Isaac, Veronica Tetley. [http://eprints.brighton.ac.uk/16612/1/Binder1.pdf "'Dressing the Part': Ellen Terry (1847-1928)"]. PhD dissertation, University of Brighton, 2016.</ref>
</references>
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Harris, Patience Glossop}} Category:1857 births Category:1901 deaths Category:British costume designers Category:Place of birth missing Category:Place of death missing Category:British women costume designers