Stained Glass Roundels with Pre-Raphaelite Lovelies

A recent commission for Berdoulat, an architectural design firm with its roots in the Arts & Crafts tradition, and an intention to create authentic products and interiors with quality craftsmanship.  Well, that's a manifesto I love to hear.

The brief was to design and paint a pair of stained glass roundels, featuring a Pre-Raphaelite beauty in each, and including the names of the clients' sons.

This was a great opportunity to revisit the work of William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones (two of my favourite stained glass designers of the era) to look for inspiration.

Sisterhood Camp 2015 / Victorian Stained Glass Roundels - Blue Tit and Goldfinch

This weekend I will be joining 24 inspiring women at the Sisterhood Camp, a weekend spent under the stars at beautiful Loveland Farm.  

Organised by the amazing Lou Archell of Little Green Shed, and sponsored by Toast, the weekend promises creative workshops, feasting, wild flower gathering, dancing, waterfall swimming and camp fires.

The aim is to share skills, dreams and goals.  To encourage, and hopefully develop, a working relationship together and inspire new directions and future collaborations. 

Feeling very lucky and excited to be invited to what will hopefully become an annual event.

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I recently painted this pair of my always-popular British Bird stained glass roundels, for a stained glass studio in London.

I spotted a real goldfinch the other day, and now they might have just taken the lead in my affections from the long-tailed tit.

Reproduction Victorian Hand-Painted Stained Glass Heron Roundels

I fell in love with this original Victorian roundel that I pinned to my bird roundels board on Pinterest a few weeks back: that magnificent heron, the poor deflated frog and his melodramatic friends and the detailed background foliage (kingcups, arum lily leaves, water reeds and yellow flag iris) make for a very unusual and charming centrepiece.

So it was a lovely coincidence to find in my email inbox a commission to paint a pair of them for some stained glass panels going in to a new door being made by bespoke London door company Voysey and Jones.

The client wanted the left hand roundel to be a copy of the original, but the right hand one was to have a happier outcome, with the frogs having escaped their grisly fate.

A couple of close ups to show detail of feathers and frogs...

Victorian Stained Glass Roundel - White Lilies

I've been very remiss at posting completed projects on here lately, mainly because work is coming in back-to-back at the moment and I barely have time to photograph it, let alone edit it and get it online! Luckily I suffered a bout of insomnia the other night (which coincided with the clocks going back - probably the most annoying of all nights to be suffering), so this roundel that I painted to replace the damaged original is one of the few that I have managed to do.

Currently I'm working on stock for a couple of Christmas exhibitions (more on that soon), a large panel with lots of irises, a bear and a rabbit in the woods and some freelance work for a couple of other stained glass studios. It's a little hectic on the workbench right now...

This / That

 

From top to bottom:

1) Lots of freelance work lately - mainly copying roundels damaged in storms. 
2) Wooden stepstool, a bargain.
3) Tools of the trade.
4) Sick day - defacing Boden catalogues with the kid.
5) More freelancing...
6) Running 10km.  Actually 11.
7) Visiting London.
8) Eating way too much dim sum in Chinatown.

Website Update

Have spent the last few evenings tweaking my website to make it look a bit more, well, websitey.

I've been working on the adage that "...a website should be a handshake, not a punch in the face".  I can't remember who coined that phrase, but I like it.  So I've taken out some of the old projects that didn't make the cut, and put in a few recent ones.

Not sure how well it translates on mobile devices - so if you're looking at it on a tablet or phone, and it's a total mess, let me know!

And while I'm crowdsourcing, I'm not sure whether to stick with the "stainedglasswindow.info" domain, or move to something more me.  Like my name for example.  Any thoughts much appreciated.

Stained Glass Bird Roundels - Chaffinch & Long-Tailed Tit.

A Chaffinch and a Long-Tailed Tit, painted for a client in South West London.

Getting the colour right on the plumage was a bit of a battle. But three additional firings later I'm pleased with the results.

Keen nature spotters will notice that the butterfly is a Common Blue.

Art Nouveau Stained Glass Door Panels

I recently finished this pair of Art Nouveau style door panels, which were designed by the client (a historic buildings archaeologist).

I had to make some minor alterations to the design in order to make it fit the dimensions of the openings, but I'm pleased with how they translated from the initial sketch I was given.

Technically quite challenging to lead, but also absolutely engrossing and absorbing - I think I must have gone through about fifty Design Matters podcasts while working on these!