Porch Window

This project began about three years ago. I was first brought in by the estate agents who were selling the house. The buyer had asked about the state of the stained glass and porch. The porch had visibly subsided and the window panel next to the door was in a very poor state. The panel was buckled, many of the joints were broken and the central painted piece was about to drop out.

I advised on the cost of making the repairs and advised that the panel should be taken out before the removal people began taking things out and moving other things in as the door post would inevitably be knocked with the moving of the furniture. I felt the painted panel was nearly ready to fall, which would have cost a great deal more to repair as well as the general repairs.

All parties agreed. However this was at the beginning of the housing and then financial crises. So I have been storing the panel for all this time. The new owners have at last sold their other house and asked for the panel to be prepared for installation.

As you can see there is a considerable drop from the wall to the door post. At some point in the future the porch will have to be rebuilt and therefore squared up. My recommendation was to build the central portion of the window as a proper rectangle and have the sacrificial border shaped to fit the opening. The owner agreed and I took a template of the irregular opening.

The angle on the bottom of the template is as skewed as it looks in this photograph. The existing panel was completely taken apart and the new leading pattern established with the wedges of sacrificial border.

Arrival and preparation for installation of the re-leaded and repaired window.

A few hours later the window is installed in its old position in the still subsided porch.

This shows the newly installed window at the entrance.

The view from the inside

The client telephoned me a week later saying how delighted they were with the window. "It seems complete now. I didn't realise how much difference it would make to have it back in place."

Now I can wait until the porch is rebuilt for the next request for re-setting it into its new position. All that will need to be done is to remove the wedge-shaped borders and put the new ones on to make it fit the proper rectangular opening.

North Gardner Street Completed

The stair windows at North Gardner street are completed! The previous notes about its development are here.

The finished windows look handsome.

Unfortunately for the photograph, the scaffolding remains outside weeks after it was to be removed. But it was fortunate for the installation of the last two windows as we did not have to take the sashes out of the casements.

Shop Windows

Over the last few months, I have been helping Alan Robinson of Ramoyle Glass with the removal, restoration and re-installation of a set of windows in what is now a dress shop in Callendar.

These premises were originally built a the turn of the 19th into the 20th century as a printers. It is now a shop called Desirables that sells timeless styles for women.

General view entrance

General view, left side of shop

These pictures show the interior view outwards. The largest window - in the corner - is approximately 1500mm wide. The all were in poor shape with lots of broken glass, especially the corner roundels. These had to be especially obtained for a good match to the existing few that remained whole.

Side window

Front right window

These show a couple of the windows in more detail. The flower forms use richly coloured handmade glass. The leaves are of rolled glass. The clear is a variety of textures of rolled glass also. Each window has a border of roundels in the corner and crackle glass along the sides.

This work was supported by the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park