Repairs in Clevedon

Even where regular maintenance is undertaken, there are accidents.  Doors seem to take the most punishment.  This house in the Clevedon area of Glasgow was subject to damage.

Even though it is set back from the road and with a gate, the glass got broken in a few places.

This is a large entry way with a grand hall behind it.

The door of course had a new break and a few others needed attention at the same time.

In addition, the fanlight above the door was rattling, although there were no breaks.  This was re-0cemented in situ.

A view of the completed repair from the inside.

This house was built in the period 1870-1890.  When compared to the entrance at a house in Bearsden built in the period 1910-1915 

[Bearsden   ] you can see that exactly the same design was used.  This shows the large studios did recycle designs, even though in this case 20-40 years later.

Repair and Protection

An existing bathroom window needed some repair, as well as consideration on how to keep the bathroom warmer.  It is a large bathroom with the glass in a steel frame.

The options seemed to be removal of the frame and installing the reworked glass in a double-glazing unit or secondary glazing.  The removal of the steel frame would require a whole new frame to be installed.  The tile work of the bathroom would be disturbed and need replacement.  All this would have involved quite a bit of expense.  In addition, the glass panels would need to be reworked into a single panel, requiring quite a bit of alteration.

The secondary glazing option would be almost as effective as double glazing, as the walls are thick enough to have more than 100mm each side of the existing frame.  And it would be much cheaper than the encapsulation and associated work.

In either case, there were panes to be repaired, and the whole window to be cleaned.

Break at left hand corner

Break at the right hand corner

Break beside a rose motif

Missing pane at the catch

The decision was to go for secondary glazing.  Because of the internal tiling, and the large space outside the frame, the secondary glazing was put on the outside.  This required a frame to be made for the protective glazing.  The glazing had a ventilation slot at the bottom to allow slow circulation of air and avoid condensation on the outside.  This is the same concept as the isothermal glazing used in churches.  This installation used a minor variation in allowing circulation of air from the bottom only, instead of all around.

The work on repairing and cleaning was conducted at the same time as the framing was done. 

Framing for secondary glazing 

The secondary glazing was attached in such a way that it can be removed for cleaning and decorative purposes.

Secondary glazing in place

The finished work shows no effect of the secondary glazing from the inside.  The pole for the washing line can be seen clearly.

The outside of the house shows no significant difference with the secondary glazing in place.

The Work I Get to Do

Finished some repairs to broken glass in this house's front door on Friday.

Front entrance from street level

The repairs completed

The replacement glass has blended very well with the existing glass.  I know which pieces I replaced, but they are not apparent in this photo and only with close inspection are the replacements revealed.  A satisfactory conclusion.

Repair of Leaded Glass Panels

I have not posted anything about the classes I offer from time to time before, but this course will include elements to help people care for their windows as well as make repairs to them.

This two day course will give you the initial skills required to undertake the repair of a damaged panel. You will learn of cartoon making, methods to disassemble panels, in situ repairs, glass selection, repair choices, and a number of other things needed to make a panel whole again. Although tools will be provided, you may wish to bring your own as well. You can also bring your own panel for diagnosis, but we will be working on a number of small panels that require repairs.

As well as being pushed in, this panel has a cracked roundel in the middle and a piece missing. Learn how to replace and repair without taking apart

This panel has several pieces broken throughout. Also it needs to be cleaned to bring it back to its former glory. Learn these "trade" secrets and more on this course

Saturday 11 - Sunday 12 October, 10:00 am to 4:00 pm.

The price of £160 covers tools, materials, and lunches.

Email me at stephen.richard43@gmail.com for bookings or further information.

Door Repair

A previous client brought me a whole door to do repairs on last week.  It used to be an inner door for a pub and is very solid.  This is a picture of the repaired glass back in the door, ready for collection.

Repaired Door panel,  re-installed

I hope you cannot see the four repairs.

Historic West Coast House Repairs

Last year I conducted repairs on the windows of an Alexander (Greek) Thomson designed house, and for the last six months or so, I have been involved in repairs and other work on a Lutyens designed house.

The stair windows had some cracks and was producing a lot of condensation.  As the roof was being repaired, the opportunity was taken to have something done about the window.

As you can see the window is awkward to get to so the roofer's scaffolding was essential.  The window panel was bowed with a number of broken lead joints.  The window is also installed directly into the stone, so there were additional breaks in getting them out. The iron work of the opening panel was completely corroded and covered in putty to try to weather proof it.

The decision was taken to re-lead and replace the broken pieces with a very good match of glass made in Poland (locally called Tatra glass). The opening panel was remade to be fixed into the stone.  The weep holes were cleared to disperse the condensation as originally intended.

The resulting finished window appears to be the same as the original.  The repairs are not distinguishable except by close examination.



The house also has a heavy external door that previously was solid.  The owners wanted more light into the hallway behind and proposed opening the wood panels to accept leaded glass.

After looking at some of the leaded window designs around the house a lozenge and diamond design was chosen.  This shows the completed door from the interior.

The door from the exterior still maintains an imposing presence, although softened by the insertion of the four panels.

Artist Panel Refurbishment

I was asked by an Edinburgh client to restore and repair a three panelled window made by her artist father in the late 1950's.  It had a number of pieces of broken and missing glass, and broken lead joints.

It needed to be completely taken apart, cleaned and re-leaded.  A couple of dozen pieces needed to be glued, and another dozen or so replaced and painted.  The plated pieces needed to be cleaned on their "insides" too, and then copper foiled to keep the cement from getting between the layers.

Dismantling the upper panel.  Rubbing of the panel is in the upper right corner

Placing the unleaded pieces on a second rubbing of the panel. The tape holding broken pieces together can be seen as white strips across the glass.

The glass used was all hand made, and often up to 6mm thick.  Where the colour of the thinner glass was not of sufficient density or a change of tone was required, the artist had double plated the piece with another colour.  

I found it difficult to perceive the whole work, because of its broken and dirty condition, until it was all together.

The panel reset into a wooden frame for installation into the church of the artist's  youth.

The top panel

Middle Panel

Bottom Panel

It is a very strong, modern work in stained glass depicting Mary with her child Christ and surrounded by women.  It does not have the usual manger and dominant or supplicant males most often associated with depictions of the birth. It will be a contrast to the rest of the windows in the East Lothian church, but will compliment the themes already there.

The next post will give information on the Church

Cloakroom Repair

I am quietly proud of this repair.  The window was broken in several ways.  There was a considerable amount of glass broken so that it was not weather tight.  There were some very amateur repairs with glass that was too small and held in place with "sticky-backed plastic".  The tie wires were mostly broken.  There were a large number of broken solder joints.

All this meant that the panel had to be taken out of the opening and repaired on the bench.  It also made it easier to repair the complicated shapes.  However, as soon as it was inspected on the bench, it became clear the whole panel needed re-leading as most joints were broken.  The client agreed that this could be done, as there was going to be little additional expense.

This photo was taken on a very sunny evening, so it washes out a lot of the intense red at the top of the panel.  I had to replace almost every transparent piece of glass and I am pleased that it is very difficult to tell which are the original and which the new.  I kept all the opalescent glass, as it forms a large part of the panel's character.  Where they were broken, I edge glued them together with Araldite 20/20 epoxy resin.

I think the outside looks really good now too.

It sits in its stone casing to the left of the front door, reflecting back the light according to the textures that are on the inside of each piece.  Fortunately the client likes the result too.

Art Deco Period windows

A while back I was asked to do repairs on some arts deco windows for a late 1920's house that was to be redeveloped.  That redevelopment is now quite a way along and I was asked to come while the window frames were being restored to do the repairs to broken panes in the windows.

Example of repaired windows in what is to be the front bedroom

While I was there, I was requested to consider what could be done with some panels rescued from the garage.  After consultation, we agreed that they would fit well in the en suite beside the existing central window.  The two side windows previously were simply textured pieces of glass.

Re-set windows for the en suite

 The new windows were prepared with green tinted glass which I painted and fired before leading into the general pattern.  These were smaller and so needed a slightly different setting than the original.  The central horizontal line combined with the repetition of the double vertical columns integrates the windows.  However rather than pretend they are original in every respect, the tinted glass distinguishes them subtly from the clear glass used in the original, central window.


These windows make the point that artistic expressions are not uniform in any "age" such as arts deco.  Although there is an obviously arts deco window in the building, the majority of the decoration follows the pattern of the bedroom windows illustrated above.

Window Repair

An IT company is moving into a mid-19th century building in the Park Circus area of Glasgow and needs to have the window on the half landing from the ground to first floor repaired.  

Window from below

This is a large window of nearly 1400 mm wide and approximately 2000 mm high.  It has a large number of broken panes, although only two - where you see the tape - have fallen out. The textures are important for this window.  Fortunately, I have an exact or very near match for almost all of the clear pieces.

Upper sash

The difficulty is to get yellow glass to match the borders of this window.  There are two main shades of yellow and a few variations - all in a seedy glass.  Seedy is a term for intentional bubbles in the glass.  Various manufacturers have different ways of getting the bubbles. I am told by the people at English Antique Glass that they throw a potato into the pot just before gathering the glass to blow.

I have looked through my glass stocks and samples and have found one yellow seedy that will match.
For the other shades I will have to stain some clear seedy to get a good match.

Window from above

The above photo just gives an impression of the colour generated on the wood of the reveal.  I think this is important to preserve.  So the experimentation has begun to obtain the correct shade of golden yellow.

Bottom sash

This will be in process for a while - making samples and testing them against the window - before staining suitably sized pieces to replace the broken ones.  These pieces will be cut on site to fit into the original place.

Of course, there is no easy way to do the repairs from the outside without incurring large charges for scaffolding.

Back of the building

Renfrew Town Hall

One more piece of work had to be fitted in before the new year.  

I have been working on various repairs to the leaded glass of the Town Hall since October.  Various work has been required, from simple cleaning of very dirty glass to extensive rebuilding of some small panels.  Protective glazing has been added to the rear entrance, and minor repairs to broken glass have been completed.

As the building neared completion, more glass was broken and needed repairs before handover.  The building company - CBC - needed to hand over the building to Renfrew Town Council before the end of the year.  Unfortunately during the work more glass was broken in the work to finish the entrance area.

So I received an appeal to come to finish the additional repairs before the 31st.

It is now done and I merely have to wait to see if there are snagging issues before I receive my first payment.  The final 5% is to be received a year after completion.  Such is the building trade.

I hope you had a good Christmas and I wish everyone the best for 2012 - I think we are going to need it.

Stair Window

I was called out to advise on what can be done for this stair window in Dunfirmline made around the beginning of the 20th century.  It is about 1200 mm wide and 1500 mm high.  It appears to be made in a single piece, which is very unusual.  It has 19 mm square glazing bars and you will notice that at the bottom there is an extra one, presumably for safety if anyone fell down the stairs they would not go through the window to the ground.

You can see there is internal secondary glazing up to where the round head of the window springs.  In spite of it being open at the top there is considerable condensation within the gap as you can see from this picture of a broken pane.  This makes the point that ventilation needs to be both at the top and the bottom.

The above image shows the only major break in this whole window.  There are of course small cracks here and there, but nothing obvious or likely to impair the function of the window.  The more major defect is at the bottom of the window where there has been a repair using violet instead of bronze coloured glass.

At the bottom, the window is beginning to develop an accordion style bend which is it major problem.  Had the window been built in three sections as I would expect for this size of window, the bottom section could be removed, taken to the studio to be flattened and repaired.  Trying to take this window out in a single section above a glassed in conservatory will be difficult and is bound to cause some breakage.

The owners have already decided to put a double glazing unit on the outside of this window.  This will have a gap of about 100 mm between the stained glass and the unit.  This will prevent any further ingress of water and drafts.  It will preserve the life of the window by many years without further action, but will not stabilise it.  I have made recommendations to the owners and await their response.

In addition, they have some breaks in this entrance screen.  They are all side by side, which is the most difficult to repair in situ.  So I am recommending that they let me take the panels out (filling the gap with clear glass) and repair them in the studio.

Acid Etched Panel

In Glasgow and throughout Scotland - and possibly many other areas - etched glass front doors and stair windows were very popular in the mid nineteenth century. These were made on plate glass of around 8 mm thick which have proved to be pretty strong, as many of them still exist. However accidents occur, or as in this case someone threw an object which hit the glass with enough force to break it.

When it came into my hands - because I use traditional techniques rather than sandblasting - it had already been removed by a firm of glaziers who did more damage to it in getting it out. They were not aware initially of the screws that held the mouldings to the door and so damaged the moulding and more of the glass. Such is life.

This image shows the front door with the glass installed. If you wish to find out about the process you can go to this section of the blog.

The smooth reflective nature of the glass from the outside is shown in this picture. It also shows the privacy generated, as it is not possible to see what is happening inside, even at this close an approach. The apparently clear portions are subtly textured by the acid process that you can only see colours through those areas.

From the inside you notice the amount of light that is transmitted. You can see how the glass reacts to the colours outside with the view against the sky at the top having little contrast, the centre against the houses opposite having strong contrast, and at the bottom showing the green of the grass outside. The etched parts become the dark positive on the grey/white of the ground glass.

The following two images show the detail of the centre and bottom of the door panel.

central detail

bottom detail

This has been prepared on laminated glass which is a security glass. If in the future there is an accident, the interlayer will hold the glass together and prevent any entry through the glass or injury to anyone from falling or protruding glass.