Illuminating glass
- The Webmaster
- Nov 10
- 2 min read
Visits to Barley Studio
Over two Wednesdays - 29th October and 5th November - 13 Rotarians and partners toured round one of York’s many unsung centres of excellence, a ‘stained’ glass design studio and workshops at Dunnington.
Innocuous looking industrial buildings on the outskirts of Dunnington contain a 10-strong body of very skilled craftspeople and we visitors were treated to the first-hand knowledge of the two most expert in the business, Keith Barley and Helen Whittaker, the directors of the company.
Having first trained at York Minster with Peter Gibson, Keith set up Barley Studio specialising in window restoration over 52 years ago; Helen joined him in 1998, as part of her academic studies into stained glass and stayed broadening the practise’s expertise into the design of modern windows.
Apart from being told of the various methods of producing ‘historic’ window glass, the first thing we learnt was that not all decorative windows are ‘stained’ glass windows, that name technically only refers to uncoloured or ‘white’ glass that has been treated with silver to stain it yellow. Then there are other ‘enamelled’ and ‘painted’ glasses where pigment is fired onto the surface. ‘Flashed’ glass is produced by applying a very thin layer of coloured glass to the surface of the white glass in the blowing process as opposed to ‘coloured’ glass which already contains the coloured pigment before being blown.
Ancient and modern methods of renewing windows by recording the templates, cutting the glass panes and fitting them into the ‘cames’ or lead H-section framing were demonstrated by the staff, who interestingly all learnt their craft on the job as there is no established stained glass apprenticeship course.
The conservation of historic window panels was another area of the practise’s work explained as almost an academic process using ingenious techniques developed in the Studio (See image at the end showing the comparison of a face pre- and post-conservation) ; as was the protective secondary glazing process, designed by Keith, having studied best practice from across Europe.
Currently the Studio is conserving the windows of St Michael-le-Belfrey in York and Helen is designing and producing a large modern 3-D window, which should be stunning to see in-situ in a year’s time.
Having seen how modern and historic practices have been refined and combined with innovation in this business, it is easy to see how this unassuming corner of Dunnington has gained a national reputation and that both Keith and Helen have received well deserved MBEs for their work.
Chris Birch
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