I have a bit of a shock for many of you. That is, if you’ve been following me for some time and aren’t sure of the difference between coloured glass and stained glass. Less than 50% of the glass you see on my website, which is coloured, is technically stained. Sorry if anyone feels misled but if I advertise “coloured leaded lights”, the chances are you’d never have found me. The term “stained glass” is used commercially to mean all sorts of things. This post attempts to clarify…
- Chemical compound coloured glass
- Hand painted glass
- Which type of glass do I prefer?
- Why I don’t deal exclusively in painted glass windows
- The makers
- Snobbery
- Learning through experience
Chemical compound coloured glass
What do you think of this window?
I think it’s a lovely Victorian style leaded top light bay window, but none of the glass is actually stained. The green will have been made by adding copper during the glass production process. As for the red, in the trade this type of glass is commonly referred to as “flash”. It’s created by coating a colourless gather of glass with one or more thin layers of coloured glass. Another example of red is using gold during the glass production process. Here’s an example…
… I’ve known it to be referred to as “pure” red and needles to say it’s a more expensive option but it’s still not stained glass!
Hand painted glass
In my opinion, the true meaning of stained glass is any that is painted and kiln fired. It’s the silver nitrate which is what gives the distinctive yellow / brown appearance. Here’s a good example because…
… it’s not been painted onto coloured glass.
It’s very common for leaded windows to have a mixture of colour compound panes and stained glass panes…
… in the above example the coloured glass is the border pieces, the roundels and the blue surrounding the roundels. Everything else is either stained or contains no colour. It’s my opinion that the term “leaded lights” exists partly because some traditional windows don’t have any colour. But the textures of the glass, sometimes very subtle, can be just as interesting.
Which type of glass do I prefer?
While I agree with the premise that true stained glass is painted/kiln fired, this doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate other types of glass made within the arts and crafts movement, the type commonly fitted in domestic British houses up until the 1970s. In fact I think I prefer it. I’m more interested in what ordinary people had in their houses than to the somewhat elitist environment of religious buildings typically portraying saints.
For instance I appreciate the artistry involved in this …
… and I appreciate many religious stained glass windows are documenting history. But I get bored with these assumptions that Jesus, if he existed, was a white man. These sort of scenes all look the same to me. Whereas I rescued this pair from a house near me in Harrow…
I never tire of examining the variety of textured glass in this pair, some of which is rolled glass, all of which were discontinued from production decades ago. In every big town there would have been a leaded light factory and therein someone designing these unique lead patterns. I’m able to identify lead patterns and the choice of glass by some regions in England as they really were unique to the factories that supplied. These designers deserve credit for producing a part of suburban architectural design which has now almost vanished but you can still see a similar interpretation of Jesus in most church windows.
Just to be clear, painted glass windows were not exclusive to religious environments…
Painted glass tends to either be in the style of ecclesiastic, heraldic, scenic or art nouveau but I’ve never seen it in Art Deco…
That’s one reason why I don’t exclusively by painted glass windows but there are several more reasons…
Why I don’t deal exclusively in painted glass windows
Painted glass windows are harder to source, let alone in a condition that would pass for reuse as a functioning window – sometimes these pieces are hanging by a thread! Owners of church buildings occasionally contact me looking for a buyer but even if they’re not expecting me to remove the windows myself, these are still huge pieces to store and ship to customers.
When it comes to large domestic hand painted windows, I’m often happy to buy damaged as I can pay less and take them apart to sell the intact parts. Take a look at this long thin leaded light containing some lovely painted fragments…
The leaded structure had almost split in half across the horizontal middle line so I’m selling as three parts…
A bird.
Small flemish panes.
A smaller window panel.
Some dealers do buy to restore but I’ve learnt it’s simpler not to invest the time and money in long-term complex projects. While I like high quality it’s not worth my paying a professional to restore so I’d rather celebrate the parts for what they are.
My customers are often owners of newly acquired houses who just want something relatively cheap and accessible to fit into a partition wall. Even if cost is not an issue, finding a reputable stained glass artist, who has nothing better to do, who can make you a bespoke window, is rarely simple.
As non-painted windows are easier to acquire, it means I can “stack ‘em high” with a quicker turnover.
The makers
There are various skill titles used in the trade: glazier, leaded light maker, stained glass artist. They are different for a reason and are not necessarily interchangeable.
You may know that I offer a bespoke referral service. Through trial and error I’ve built up a knowledge of who can be relied upon in England to produce traditionally made, good quality, leaded lights. I’ve learnt that producing panes of stained glass is a separate trade to making the leaded structure (a window panel/leaded light) within which these are fitted. But again, the average consumer is unaware of this. I’ve unfortunately learnt that there are some very talented stained glass artists who also “turn their hand” to leaded light making rather than subcontract. (The topic of the art and skills of leaded light construction is for another blog post!)
Snobbery
There’s a lot of this about in the “stained glass” business and at times I think it’s justified, but I have just as much regard for well made traditional leaded lights regardless of whether the glass is painted. What I disdain are uPVC windows imitating traditional leaded lights, which I’ve already explained in other areas of my website and blogs.
The other difficulty I have is the arts and crafts gift market for two reasons. If you type “stained glass” into the likes of Etsy you’ll find all sorts of “suncatchers”; these are often little pieces of modern machine-made hobby glass dangling in a copper foil structures. The other reason is that this market harbour’s modern made panes of “painted” glass made to look like and described as “vintage” or “antique”. But reproductions are a topic for another blog post.
There’s so much artisan craft based architectural salvage lying around Great Britain that I can’t understand why more people don’t want to utilise it within new art pieces.
Learning through experience
I should make it clear that I didn’t know much of the above until after I started dealing and I’ve still got so much to learn. That’s why I enjoy this unusual trade of mine. This post may also be a work in progress so if you have any points of factual accuracy or additional comments, I’d like to hear from you.
At the time of publishing this post, most of the items featured in the above photographs were for sale.
