The three families in the collection – the Altstadts, the Picks and the Mayers – are all related through Clara Altstadt and her mother Irma Mayer. Irma was born in the mid-1860s to David and Betty Pick. She had two elder brothers, Wilhelm and Gyula. The family seem to have been successful businessmen based in Hungary, Wilhelm living in in Steinamanger (Szombathely) and Gyula in Ozora and later Budapest; Betty and Irma apparently lived in Steinamanger with Wilhelm.

In 1890 Irma Pick married Jacques Mayer. He was the son of Albert Mayer, who worked in textiles in Prossnitz (Prostějov), Moravia. Irma settled in Prossnitz and had two children with Jacques – Albert and Klara.

Klara married Moritz Altstadt in October 1918. He was orginally from Lwóv (now, L’viv) and had moved to Vienna to work in the shoe business; eventually he set up what would become the second-largest shoe manufacturer in Austria. They settled in Vienna, although Klara ran a property rentals business in Prossnitz, and had two children, George and Sylvia.

In summer 1938, the Altstadts immigrated to Lenzie, Scotland, to escape the Nazis. Klara became Clara. Moritz established two new businesses in Scotland, in which Clara and George both worked. Moritz died in 1949. Clara continued to rent out properties on the continent and later moved to Jersey, with George accompanying her. Sylvia settled in Belgium. Clara died in 1994, George in 2006 and Sylvia in 2018.