A message from William Blake....

A Very Happy Peaceful Christmas to You

Santé!

I recently completed this little panel of grapes and vine leaves to go into an old house in France that was part of a vinery. The grapes are all different hand made glass tints and the leaves a mix of textured glasses. The border is a streaky rippled glass of greens and purples and browns.

now all that's needed is one of these...

good company and some glasses! 

More on Art Deco...

I recently completed a skylight influenced by one of my favourite stained glass artists Louis Barillet (1880 - 1948). Louis Barillet's designs were full of the energy and buzz of the era and he made maximum use of clear textured glasses...

 

Spectacular, sadly this building on the outskirts of Paris was a museum now closed!

I took the central rays from this design which linked to the 2 Art Deco light fittings either side of the skylight 

Art Deco Light

to create a skylight.

the clear textured glasses of this sharp design help obscure the attic above.

Here is a rambling tour through a tiny fraction of my favourites in Art Deco land!

I love these simple shop fronts...

Crewkerne.

Whitstable

Note the surface effect of the textured glass in reflected light!

East Greenwich, London

Central Greenwich, London (sadly removed)

Llandudno.

The Tuschinski Cinema in Amsterdam...

Domestic / deocorative….

Classic sun rays.

House in Melbourne Australia. 

Kees Kuiler (1890 - 1966)

Art Deco inspired panel at the Stained Glass Shop Wandsworth, early 2000.

Art Deco influences live and influence current design...

If this blogpost has made you curious to find out more about Art Deco design here are a couple of really excellent websites...

The Art Deco Society has a buildings at risk list where you can sign petitions to help save threatened buildings all over the country;

https://artdecosociety.uk/buildings-at-risk/  

The London Footprints website has a really comprehensive list of Art Deco buildings in London

https://www.london-footprints.co.uk/artdecobldgs.htm

Art Deco - Architectural Punk?

Its fascinating to see how architecture reflects the ideas of the time. In the conflicting emotions following the First World War, where many designers sought the security of traditional forms and safe ideas, a movement grew which was bold and shocking, rejecting traditional forms and looking instead towards a future where design was lacking in ornamentation, was more affordable being geared towards mass production and with the overall aim of being accessible to all.

In stained glass bold, energetic, angular shapes were in, along with using texture (as opposed to colour) to mark different sections. In this job I was asked to restore 3 original panels saved from a neighbours house. Often these designs use large pieces of textured glass which can be hard to source...

The clear textured glasses in these panels were a mix of Arctic (original pattern), Glistre (Large pattern) and Rimpled glass. The red cross is glass from a previous repair that needs replacing with Glistre in the matching shape above. The red circles below are all cracked panes that need replacing.

Photo courtesy of S. Fox

The blue border glass has a subtle streak...

When the missing glass is replaced and the panels are releaded, recemented and polished the textures come to life...

Photo (and fitting) courtesy of Phil Charles

and they still make as bold and optimistic a statement as when they were first fitted some 85 odd years ago.

Photo courtesy of Phil Charles

Photo courtesy of Sam Fox

Photo courtesy of Sam Fox

Complimented by the hard work and dedication of this customer sourcing door furniture, colour and much of the glass to get an authentic period look. 

The Thistle and the Rose!

I recently completed 2 door panels where the customers wanted to reflect the rose design from their original porch tiles in the door panels.

I was able to do this in the design of the central feature...

They were also lucky to have the original hallway tiles too and wanted the colours to compliment each other...

In addition to the central rose feature I had some very unusual vintage glass brought back from Chartres which featured both the rose and the thistle.

 It was perfect to reflect this Scottish / English home.  

David Woolfson

Beautiful work exhibited today by David Woolfson at The New Artist Fair, The Truman Brewery (off Brick Lane), stunning, glowing images on acrylic glass...

The background shows works from 'The Undiscovered Planets' series.

To see more of David's amazing work and contact the artist please visit David's website here

Nice Mention!

On the Virtual Museum of Poole Pottery, a fascinating well researched site that you can spend a very long time browsing!

Front door panels inspired by a Tony Morris design of pollarded trees and adapted by Ian Marshall.