Art Deco Modernism!

Some designs are hard to classify crossing styles and proving how fluid and adaptable a 'period style' can be. These panels make the most of the enormous range of textured glasses produced (mainly) by Chance Brothers and later Pilkingtons across a span of 100 or so years but also mixed in some hand made glasses. A list of many of the glasses used is at the end of this blog...

Thank you to Jean Letherby and her husband for giving me this beautiful lens amongst other glass samples saved from their long career as theatre lighting designers.

Textured glasses used; Muranese, Spotlyte, Festival, Pilkingtons no's 1,2 and 3! Arctic (green, blue and clear), Muroglass, Borealis, Sparkle, Cross Reed, Half Inch Reed, Rivuletta, Ribbed Rolled, Corded, Fibroid, Flemish, Crackle, Japanese, Lustre, Masterpoint, 'Stars and Swirls', Fleur, Orbit, Stipolyte, Luminating, Pacific, Starburst, Glistre, Corella, Rimpled, acid etched, Master Carre, Kokomo. Handmade; Green Venetian, Danziger, Hartley Wood, Saint-Just, English Antique Glass and Tatra. Plus a few other glasses that I do not know the names of!

Thank you to Pete True and his father for saving the small arctic glass from his garage doors, thank you to David Encill for generously giving me his Festival glass.   

Open Studios Summer 2018 - dates for your diary!

Just heard we have our yearly Open Studios at Thames-Side Studios, Woolwich, 9th and 10th June, 12 noon - 6pm. Please check back again - more info to follow...

"Pictures have voices that the soul can hear"

In the 1870s the Haberdashers Company laid out the plans for Hatcham Manor Estate in (now) New Cross, London. The houses were designed as high quality residences with beautiful traditional stained glass in the front doors much of which remains...

For the internal decoration of doors one of the builders at least, used the services of an American company based in William Street, New York to supply a variety of printed transfers, giving the illusion of stained glass....

With different designs being used across the estate...

This technique became very popular in the Victorian era and a variety of different manufacturing processes over many years led to it being called various names e.g. "Crystograph", "Glacier", "Vitramanie" and Diaphanie". As the extract below illustrates it was exciting and new and was expected / hoped to fast supersede fusty old (traditional) stained glass.

Jones, C.S., Mrs., and Williams, Henry T. Household Elegancies: Suggestions in Household Art and Tasteful Home Decorations. 4th ed. New York: Henry T. Williams, 1877. "Transparencies on Glass, Etc.": "Vitremanie": p. 25.

Depending on the process being used sometimes the paper transfer was left on and 'cemented' to the backing glass while with later techniques the paper was removed and just the print remained on the glass. With the Hatcham Manor Estate panels the paper is still there. Photos sent to me of other panels in the same estate show clean breaks but there are also water marks and leaching on the panels that I was working to preserve and a fragment that I was given clearly had paper remaining.

Clean breaks...

leaching...

Though this type of work may be cheaper then traditional stained glass, because the glass 'sandwich' is so thin, perhaps just over 1mm deep, when it breaks the whole piece is damaged. Whereas with stained glass individual pieces can be replaced and the whole preserved much more easily.

Fortunately the damage to the panels I was asked to help preserve was not as bad as the badly cracked one above with single and a few multiple cracks but hanging together...

Single (above) and multiple cracks (below).

It seems impossible to find anyone to replace or repair this glass so the best hope was to preserve and protect it by putting 4mm toughened glass into the sight line both sides. Laminate film was also recommended but with the cracks and the water marks it didn't seem a good idea to get water near it (for floating / placing the film). End result the panels will hopefully be secured for many more years...

Transfer glass never achieved the expectations of its early enthusiasts, it never got to provide "a daily word of wisdom that will speak openly to every member of the household on sacred or historic themes, or the beauties of creation". In domestic glass it is relatively rare now and little is still known of the intricacies of the processes. Fortunately there are some great sources of information and if this post has interested you and you would like to find out more check out the excellent article 'The Conservation of Chromolithographic Windows in St Benet's Chapel, Netherton and the Origins of Transfer Printing on Glass' by Mark Bambrough in The BSMGP Journal vol XXXIX. You can order article reprints from the BSMGP here; http://www.bsmgp.org.uk/Publications/.

Thank you Paul Chasse, librarian from the Corning Museum of Glass for researching my request for info and sending a copy of Household Elegancies amongst other fascinating Victorian reference material. What a truly excellent service you provide.

If you live in the area and have any photos of this type of glass or any further information to add please feel free to get in touch and I will post your photos / info at the end of this blog.

Streatham Style

It's always satisfying to bring back together a door set with missing pieces. This beautiful Victorian house was missing it's main door panel and had a fanlight in need of repair...

 The customer wanted to restore the original street design but with some personal preferences. 

A beautiful centre was based on an original Victorian design and painted by the stained glass artist Emma Blount.

The fanlight was cleaned, rebuilt and repainted.

Before 

After.

Fanlight detail showing unusual cast glass original roundel.

 Fortunately the small door panels were intact and still in good condition.

The new door set, ready for the 21st Century...

Photo and fitting courtesy of John Mahoney.

The Mountains of Hither Green!

It was a real pleasure to design, make and install this fanlight panel depicting the Alps. The distinctive profile / skyline of the Alps was retained but a more abstracted / shattered look developed for the mountains and fields below and for the sky above. It was a fantastic opportunity to light up the mountains with clear glasses which catch the light at different angles / times of the day. The fields and stylized woods are also in a range of unusual vintage and modern glasses.

 

Houses along this street have a very unique and unusual original feature, a white glass tile (with house number) fixed to the front of the fanlight glass.

Below are some making shots...

  

All glass is blue tacked up and any colours / glasses that don't work can be changed.

Panel leaded up, before soldering. 

Snow on the mountain range - whiting helps to dry the panel during cementing!

Westcombe Park

Westcombe Park in South East London has some really spectacular Victorian stained glass. It's Victoriana at it's most sparkliest! In this house a fanlight was added to the existing original set of panels. It's impossible to get an exact match for some of the original textured glasses but luckily Victorian Muranese (the clear textured glass around the roundels) is still fairly common and a new version in a range of colours is made now.

New fanlight being added to match original surrounding panels.

Leaded house number, a slight adjustment from the original street fanlight style.

Original side panel showing diamond jewels, painted centre and cast glass roundels with lots of heavily textured, sparkly surrounding glass!

Many of the houses in this area have beautiful mosaic tiles in the hall.

My customer had the idea that he would very much like to see this pattern replicated in a mezzanine area that needed brightening up...

So we used the basic mosaic design which worked perfectly to create some colourful panels using both vintage and modern textured and handmade glasses...

This clear vintage glass pattern rarely comes into stock, luckily I had just enough to complete the set.

Below are a couple of shots during making...

Plan in progress

Plan approved by the black and white inspector!

Finalising / checking glasses in the studio before leading up.