After several years of training as a weaver in her native Sweden, Lillian Holm came to Cranbrook in 1929 to work in the newly organized Weaving Room at the Arts and Crafts Studios.

She returned to Sweden for a year to pursue graduate studies before being appointed as Kingswood’s first full-time weaving and crafts instructor in 1933. With a campus filled with Scandinavian art and architecture -- from Saarinen’s design of Cranbrook School to Milles’ Jonah and the Whale statue -- it was a fitting environment for Holm.

For 32 years, she shared her weaving skills with students and displayed her craft to galleries across the United States. Famed collectors such as Eleanor Roosevelt and Katherine Cornell acquired some of Holm's works.

Holm retired from the school in 1965, but several of her tapestries remain on display at the Cranbrook Academy of Art and Kingswood.