Heraldic Windows

Between 2009 and 2010, Brian Clarke incorporated six nineteenth-century heraldic glass panels which he found in a sale into the windows of Peel Cottage.

In a 2020 ‘lockdown tour’ conducted on social media, Clarke explained:

'What I liked about them was how exquisitely well-made they are: the leading is virtuoso, the silver-staining and painting is absolutely first rate, the expression of all the heraldic devices and detailing is, for anybody who loves stained glass, just so beautifully done, and I derive enormous pleasure from 19th century glass (the average level of quality is just superb). And I took these armorials, about 6 of them, and set them into works where I extended the leaded grid in them into the space outside of them, so that they could be accommodated into windows in my house, which is also 19th century. Within that framework I then disturbed the matrix of the leading by drawing through it with nervous linear interruptions to the rectilinear grid. And they're dotted all about my house. My glazed areas that incorporate my leading and drawing are much more transparent than the 19th century areas, which all have a soft coating of paint or silver stain over them, so you never get complete transparency, except for on the occasional large piece of ruby, for example in the fish in the right-hand light - you see the change in colour from pink to orange is very beautiful.’