Technical Inquiry GLASS IN THE 19 TH AND EARLY 20 TH CENTURY Tony Benyon The development of Antique and other glasses used in 19 th- and 20 th-century stained glass plate 4 (overleaf ): lass painting at the beginning of the nineteenth century consisted of applying Detail of a Henry Genamels to the surface of glass which was so thin and lacking in body that if Holiday cast any area was left unpainted it would appear to be a hole in the glazing. ‘Puddle’ slab, first 1 made and used by One of the most influential glass painters of this time was Charles Muss him in the 1890 s. (1779 -1824 ), enamel painter, etcher and stained glass artist, who worked in The slabs were London and trained James Henry Nixon, 2 who later entered into a partnership made at the 3 4 Fulham Glass with the London glazier Thomas Ward. John Pike Hedgeland managed the studio House, where he of Mary Muss after the death of her husband, Charles. Employed in the same had a studio, by dropping glass workshop at that time was Benjamin Baillie, who together with Nixon worked on rods and frit onto the restoration of the medieval glass in St Neot’s Church, Cornwall, and on making a hot metal plate. new windows to complement the existing glazing. The other dominant London It was a rather casual process and glazier at the beginning of the nineteenth century was Thomas Willement who the resulting glass made his first window in 1812 . He also trained a generation of glaziers and glass was often poorly painters, including William Warrington and Michael O’Connor. annealed and would not cut Muss and Willement in their endeavours to restore medieval glass and make without flying, in new stained glass windows had only three types of glass available to them: thinly which case it was melted down spun crown glass that was made with kelp ash rather than wood ash; imported 5 once again. Continental cylinder sheet famed for its transparency and thinness; and flint glass – which had a little more body and richness of colour than the former. Transmitted light was controlled with enamel matts or applications of couverte on the exterior surface in an attempt to stop the thin glass glaring and to make it glow in the manner of medieval glass. Kelp ash gave British crown glass unique properties because it reacted to silver 6 stain by darkening from yellow to a ruby colour through repeated firing ( FIG . 1). The three studios of Willement, Warrington and William Wailes 7 (who had been making stained glass from 1838 ), all employed glass painters trained in the Georgian era. Many of them became practised in painting to match medieval glass by applying antiquing techniques such as splattering to simulate the effect of pitting and corrosion, and using matts to reproduce the patina of time. In 1845 , the restriction that only allowed glass houses to make either flint or crown glass – but not both – was lifted; 8 as were many of the constraining excise duties and taxes which coincided with the neo-gothic building boom and an increase in stained glass commissions. A. W. N. Pugin, attempting to design stained glass with the qualities of medieval glass, believed that he could not achieve the results he wished for by employing the services of Willement, Warrington or Wailes and their glass-painting techniques. He also considered their work to be too expensive. In 1845 he persuaded John Hardman of Birmingham to establish a stained glass workshop and encouraged him to source new glass, in particular, a streaky ruby that emulated medieval glass from the glass manufacturer James Hartley of Sunderland. 9 The quest for a medieval-type glass: Antiques and Rubies A new type of glass was also required for the general restoration of medieval glazing schemes which were widespread at this time. In 1847 , the Bristol-based 184 GLASS IN THE 19 TH AND EARLY 20 TH CENTURY glass painter Joseph Bell was instructed by the Bristol and West of England Architectural Society (BWEAS) to buy ‘Ancient Glass for Painting on’ from the lead and glass merchants ‘Messrs Stock & Sharpe of Cannon Street, Birmingham’ for the restoration of the medieval glass in Bristol Cathedral. In the same year Pugin wrote ‘I found that flint glass was indispensable for richness of colour. Crown glass was cut with a diamond and had to be ground with a tool. This added at least 20 percent on the labour but I did not hesitate a moment in adopting it’. 10 Undoubtedly this last reference was to a small crown (not the large thin spun sheet) that varied in thickness with an irregular surface and would have been difficult and therefore more expensive to cut into the intricate shapes found in mosaic stained glass designs. Harry Powell referred to it as ‘Much used crown glass – spun small not large’. 11 Messrs Stock & Sharpe, lead and glass merchants, would have acted as agents to James Hartley, amongst others, who was regarded as the expert maker of crown fig. 1: glass 12 and had moved from Chance of Birmingham 13 in 1836 to start his own Early 19 th- manufacturing works in Sunderland. century Cylinder 14 Sheet glass with The Order Books of James Powell & Sons (Powell’s) reveal that ‘Antique’ stained kelp glass glass first appeared in 1858 in a reference to a ‘Flashed blue circle on Hartley’s centre. The origin of this glazed Antique Ruby’, sold by the firm to Hale church near Salisbury. Over the next few panel (discovered 15 years the Order Books record more references to Hartley’s ruby or ruby sheet. at the Fulham Not long afterwards Chance Brothers advertised ‘Antique Sheet’ in the catalogue Glass House) is unknown. for the International Exhibition of 1862 , and in 1885 Fred Miller in his book The Training of a Craftsman described the manufacturing of ‘Antique’ glass as being the same as crown glass, concluding that ‘Sheets of Antique are in the round’. 16 The term ‘Antique’ was originally applied to these small spun crowns which possessed qualities that provided glazing with an antique appearance – just as glass painting techniques such as splattering were described as ‘antiquing’ processes. Pugin had not been alone in wanting a new glass to reproduce the qualities of medieval glass. His quest ran almost parallel to that of the barrister and stained glass enthusiast Charles Winston, who had been an advisor to the BWEAS and Joseph Bell in 1847 , and who knew all about Hartley’s antique crowns. In 1850 Winston was shown samples of ruby glass that Thomas Ward had received from James Hartley. Winston may have approached Hartley to manufacture his glass, but in fact it was Powell’s (who before 1845 had been manufacturing only flint glass) 17 who agreed to make muff glass to the recipes of Winston’s collaborator, Mr Medlock. 18 These recipes were the result of chemical analysis of medieval glass. In the light of Winston’s interest in medieval material, it is ironic that he championed the work of 185 GLASS IN THE 19 TH AND EARLY 20 TH CENTURY fig. 2: Chance ‘Antique’ sheet c. 1930 s, from the glass stock of the Fulham Glass House. A rare Gold Pink that survived only because it was so well concealed in the glass racks by its owner that he or she forgot all about it. fig. 3: Prior’s ‘Early English’ Glass, showing slab side and bottom; manufactured in either the late 19 th or early 20 th century. 186 GLASS IN THE 19 TH AND EARLY 20 TH CENTURY fig. 4: Left, Prior’s ‘Early English’ slab c. 1900 ; right, Kilner bottle slab c. 1930 s, used by Lowndes & Drury. Evidently it was cheaper to cut up old or even new oblong Kilner bottles (when the tints were suitable) than it was to buy slabs. fig. 5: Left, Prior’s ‘Early English’ slab c. 1900 ; right, Hartley Wood slab c. 1930 s. 187 GLASS IN THE 19 TH AND EARLY 20 TH CENTURY George Hedgeland, who was not an exponent of mosaic stained glass . In 1852 , the year of Pugin’s death, the first window to include Winston’s glass was designed and made by the firm of Ward & Hughes and installed at the Temple Church, London. 19 1855 marked the founding of three important Victorian stained glass firms: Clayton & Bell; Heaton & Butler (later with Bayne); and Lavers & Barraud (later with Westlake) – all initially employing a 13 th-century style of linear glass painting supported with half tones and with some areas of glass left unpainted. However, there is no evidence that any of these studios used Winston’s streaky glass – although they did use some variegated pot metals that must have been manufactured as a result of Powell’s experimental glass-making. Sales of ‘Winston’s’ glass appeared in the Powell’s Order Books until 1862 , when they stopped abruptly. The fact may be explained by William Burges who wrote: ... the former has been made from receipts furnished by Mr Winston, who has devoted a great deal of time and care to the analysis of the old glass. Unfortunately Messrs Powell will persist in blending the colour fig. 6: 1970 s too much with the metal, and the consequence is that the sheets for the Hartley Wood most part come out all of a tint, instead of being streaky and clouded. bottle presented What little does happen to possess the latter qualities, the firm naturally by the firm to Carl Edwards keeps for its own work, and thus the stained glass manufacturer cannot for last large obtain what he wants most… .