Sunday, 5 June 2011

More modern glass from Chester

If they've got their creation window tucked away in the dining room, you might imagine that in the main body of the kirk, Chester cathedral would have something worth looking at too. The 3 windows you see below are the Westminster windows - paid for by the Duke of Westminster - which were installed in 1992 to celebrate the 900th anniversary of the founding of the cathedral.


The windows that originally occupied this slot were damaged during the war. Some elements of the original windows have been salvaged and incorporated into the  design of the new windows.







You would wonder that it was possible, I mean it's hardly small, but I almost missed this window on the way out. It was made by W T Carter Shapland in 1961.


St Werburgh is the patron saint of this  cathedral, which is why she is holding a church (in the same way St Ninian can be seen holding a church in a sculpture just outside Whithorn). She was originally buried in Hanbury in Staffordshire in 699 but was dug up and brought here years later. Her original shrine was destroyed and her body scattered in the reign of Henry VIII, but another shrine has since been built - it should appear in a later blog. Keep an eye on St Oswald too, to whom the church was also dedicated in 975 - he's due to make another blog appearance soon (or at least part of him)



11 comments:

Sultan said...

Wow, nice. It must be great fun to make stained glass.

John @ Beans and I on the Loose said...

Impressive enough to see on a computer monitor, I cannot begin to imagine the feeling of seeing it all in real life. Very nice.

Crafty Green Poet said...

beautiful stained glass,

The Glebe Blog said...

These are great Sandy.
I don't know if this is Uk manufactured glass.We've lost a lot of our manufacturing to foreign competition,but I know we still produce a lot of glass.
Looking at Joopercoopers pages on Chester Cathedral most of the designers are home grown,lets hope the production is too.

Janet at New Moon Glass said...

Wow!...that's some impressive glass!

Unknown said...

I can't imagine how much work went into creating those windows. Such painstaking craftmanship!

Sandy's witterings said...

Laoch - must certainly be very satisfying -I'v enever turned my habd to arty things so I'll content myself to look.

Sinbad and you, I'm quite pleased at how my photos of windows have been turning out lately but you're right, they can't compete with the real thing.

Thank Juliet.

Jim, Never heard of Joopercoopers until now but it's a handy wee tour of the cathedral on wiki (if you've been there you can probably guess that more Chester Cathedral will appear in future blogs.
The Westminster windows were by the late Alan Younger - definately a brit (a londoner it seems) and little information on W.T.Carter Shapland appears on the net but most, if not all, his windows appear in Britain it seems so he's likely a Brit too.

Thanks Janet.

Chip, I should imagine a huge amount of works goes into these window - they must be produced by people with substantial studios and a good bit of help - I'd be mighty impressed if you could make this in your garage.

Michael (Light-In-A-Box) said...

Once again Sandy these are true works of art! Excellent captures with your camera too! Thanks for dropping by my blogger recently..

DeniseinVA said...

Brilliant photos of all the stained glass windows. I love the lighting, so sharp and clear. And a lovely bit of history to go with it. Thanks Sandy.

Poppy (aka Val) said...

I love stained glass, and to see them with the sun shining on them is something else. Great set of photos, I have never been to Chester, but have persuaded my husband to do a trip to Ely later in the year, there will be a blog about the Cathedral for sure :):)

Sandy's witterings said...

Welcome Taio and thanks for popping in and commenting Michael, Denise and Poppy (look forward to Ely appearing)