Stained Glass Windows

My husband is obsessed with the stained glass windows in this church. He has gone through several potential options for restoring and protecting them, studying online sources, watching YouTube videos, and schmoozing with a glass store owner he found. The 11 windows will all have to be removed and straightened out and flattened. This would cost an absolute fortune (about $40,000) if done by a professional, so I am going to learn how to do it myself. My husband has plans to redo the wood surrounding them (beautifully rich with a deep patina) so that they will hinge. They will be covered on the outside with new double-paned windows (which may or may not slide open, still to be determined), but vented to the inside to release the built-up heat so the warping does not recur. And if they can be opened like shutters, we can get inside to clean and we’ll be able to see out the clear outer glass. Right now, you can’t see outside from the sanctuary, and I am a passionate sky-observer. They do provide a beautiful pink and purple glow, though, especially as dawn first illuminates them, giving the sanctuary a wonderful cosy feeling.

We have taken down one set of windows so far, gingerly at first, then with increasing force as the wood proved to be swollen tight and stuck fast. This involved dangerous teetering on railings over open stairwells, but we managed to get them out and bring two portions home (each window has five portions, times eleven, which makes 55 portions to do). I've spread them out on our dining table and invested in tools, from dainty dental picks to soldering irons and chisels. 

So far I have chiseled out the glazier's putty holding them in their wood frames, picked out the crumbling old cement from under the cames (lead strips), and heated the windows in the sun under a heavy dark coat. I put a board over them and added bricks to gradually weight them, making them flat. There are some old stress fractures that I sealed with super glue to make them stable, but no glass appears to be shattered or missing. Then I brushed the joints with a wet brass-bristled brush. The next step is to get up my nerve to solder the joints that have come apart and then re-cement the cames (which looks finicky), and then there will be a final cleaning before my husband returns them to their frames, which he has been stripping and sanding and staining in the garage. I figure each window will take us a month or two, and we are fast-approaching the season when the sun will disappear. At that point, my husband says he will construct a heat box with a heat lamp for softening the lead. Our old heat lamp we used for our chameleon may come in handy.

I fear I am not going to see my dining table again for a long time.

Meanwhile, we are canvassing window companies to find someone who will custom-making the plain glass windows to go behind the stained glass panels, along with the twelve basement windows, and also the five-foot-in-diameter round window in the loft. I now know more about glass and windows than I ever thought I'd know. I do think it's fun, though, and picking cement out of the cames with the dental pick is actually quite meditative.

As I'm working, I can see where the original maker made some mistakes. Bits of soldering dripped in the wrong spot that pushes the glass out of line. Squarish corners hidden by round cames. The person who made these windows in 1939 likely thought no one would ever find out their shortcuts and shortcomings. A lesson to us all.