The end to a nice (long running job) today. It's nice to have a client who knows what they want and wanting the job to look as authentic as is feasably possible. It is also really nice to have a customer that wants to have some traditional glass painting done to give the job an added wow factor. My thanks to Petri Anderson of Mongoose Stained Glass for the painted goldfinches. The job wouldn't look the same without them.

A nice restoration/conservation job. Flat bar frames have been around for hundreds of years and the simplicity of them has a certain charm. The pictures show the process from beginning to end to return these frames back to how they will have looked back in the day. The diamond leaded panels are restorations of the badly damaged originals.

Back from holiday and here's what I'm doing. Stripping 150-200 years of paint off of 4 flat bar metal frames. Dirty smelly dusty work.

The things you come across clearing out your Dads workshop (he taught me my trade) Glass quary, "cut" with glass pliers (grozing pliers) in 1444. Not bad for 573years old.

A job comes to a satisfactory completion. This window is a reproduction that was made about 20years ago. Unfortunately due to the fact it is so big, and in a front door, the design will always end up suffering from the constant movement of the door. A classic example why the design of a window should always be competed with provision for re enforcing bars.

By 19:15 this evening the panel certainly looked a lot different. Cementing next week and fitting in the door where it came from.

Wish me luck!

Not posted for a while. The culmination of quite a few weeks work today. Not the "prettiest" of windows, but it certainly makes everything look 1000x smarter. The original windows were prefab "critell" type casement frames that were very poorly made and in a bad state. The amount of paint on the glass not only looked ugly, but was cutting a massive amount of light out. The brief was to replace the existing zinc metal casements with traditional leaded lights with the same diamond pattern. So after a lot of measurents, templates and work, the finished result was installed over two days. I hope you can agree that the finished result is both more elegant and sharp looking, as well as cleaner looking.

Just a small update with a before and after. As you can see from the first photo, a rather poorly front door panel. Second photo is the window taken apart ready for new glass to be cut to replace the smashed stuff. ( quite a bit of smashed glass in this one) Third photo is the newly repaired version all soldered up ready for cementing. Not a bad days work.

Well, today marked the end of a really enjoyable job. I was contacted by a new customer wanting something put in the windows of thier lovely new home. Below are photos from the entire process. The first three are computer designs and those designs superimposed on a photo of the existing window to give a "representation" of the final look. See what you think vs the end result? I am really pleased with the final outcome of this job. A nice cold crisp day today to fit it too with plent of sunshine. Thanks everyone.

Trying out a new light table. iPhones don't do colours well though. The light table is actually a daylight corrected colour, not slightly orange. Regardless, I'm rather impressed.

All the glass cut for a customers bedroom window (5 panels in a converted chapel). 380 separate pieces of glass. 1384 individual cuts with the glass cutter. I think that will do me for today!