"Your glass has faded"

I act as a consultant to a traditional window frame restorer. The other week I was called out after a variety of alternatives were offered to the householder. The householder wanted to keep the leaded glass which dates from the 1920's. It turns out that such radically different alternatives had been offered that an independent assessment of the windows was wanted. As a service to the restorer, I went out early one evening on my way home.

Upon arrival, I was told that so far she had been offered the options of:
- Replace the lot with a new design. The existing windows are so old that retaining them will be difficult
- Triple glaze. Put the leaded glass inside a double glazing unit
- Replace the lot with a new copy. The reason you need to do this is because the glass has faded and is not as bright now as it was originally.

The glass is a mixture of a lightly tinted textured glass background in which the milky glass that turns amber in strong sunlight and a few streaky colours were combined into a stylised motif. The Stained Glass Overlay man was adamant that his material was superior to the original and was guaranteed for ten years.

Well, of course, I disagreed with all of them. The windows are sound. The ties are all still attached to the glazing bars. No work at all is required, as there are not even cracks in the existing glass.

However some work is required on the door. One of the nine light door panels requires re-leading and most of the others require re-puttying. The others had made no comment on the door at all. Oh, and the sidelights were sound too.

Maybe this illustrates why SGO is a thriving business and I have not yet been able to franchise my business over the world. It also shows the underhand - in my opinion - business practices of some people in the stained glass world. The other two companies do traditional leaded glass as a large element of their businesses.

But for me, the statement "Your glass has faded" now ranks along the statement that "All your leaded glass windows are going to flow until they become a puddle on the sill. You need to have these windows recreated on toughened glass to preserve them."

Somebody needs to preserve the clients from such "unethical" practices.

Parade Artists Spring Show

As some of you will know, I am part of an organisation in the building that is currently called Parade Artists. We are about to have our Spring Show. If any of you are in the area, please come along. There will be self-portrait and mask making sections as well as the show proper.

In addition, one of my pieces made it onto the invitation, which I now extend to you.

Any of you who are in Glasgow on these days are welcome to come and make yourself known. I hope to see some of you. In any case, have a look at the variety of talented artists who are part of the Parade Artists organisation.

It is possible to survive without a computer

My apologies for my two month absence. My relatively new computer (nine months old) died on me and has only returned in operating condition to me today.

I have not been entirely without internet access, but it has been limited to short excursions to get and reply to essential e-mails. I don't suppose this two month period will be sufficient to change my habits, but I did get a lot more reading done, more walks in the woods, more conversations with my wife and friends. I should take it as an instruction to limit my use of the internet to the priority areas, of which this is one.

I am back and will make efforts to fill in the gap and keep people up to date.