Broken Panel Fragments
Fallen fragments of the west window at English Martyrs church photographed on April 11th 2010, The defective upper central transom broke free the previous morning, sending the stained glass/dalle de verre panel above it crashing to the ground where it shattered on the grass below.
It is now clear that the major factor in the declining condition of this window is the poor load bearing capacity of the concrete transoms and their weak connection to the main mullions. The lowest row of panels are bowed and sagging precariously as a result of the weak structure supporting them. Thus the poor condition of the window is as much a failure of the architectural design as much as the nature of the glazing.
Hillmorton's Roman Catholic church of the English Martyrs was built in 1965 (architects Sandy & Norris) with a square core surmounted by an expanse if coloured glass on all four sides forming a lantern, and capped by a concrete vaulted ceiling. Below it was envisaged that four limbs would sprout from this nucleus to form a cross, though in the event only one was built to the north, which served as the nave until the church was re-orientated in the early 1980s when a new sanctuary extension was added to the east.(the old nave being walled off and serving as the church hall ever since). The remaining two temporary walls below the vast windows were finished in brick only in 1990.
The major artistic feature of the building is the enormous expanse of stained glass by noted Welsh artist Jonah Jones, executed in the dalle de verre ('slab of glass') technique popular in the 1950s & 60s, with heavy chunks of glass set in a resin matrix (in place of traditional lead, which would be insufficient to hold such thick pieces of glass). The design of the four windows is abstract, though each incorporates a subtle crown of thorns motif in red glass.
However, times have changed and the dalle de verre technique has not stood the test of time well. Though the east and north windows remain in sound condition those on the south and particularly the west have suffered from the effects of heat expansion which has caused several of the glass pieces to detach from their resin matrix, whilst in the worst cases the resin structure itself is failing, in places cracked and bowing dangerously. Finding a remedy to these problems seems to be frought with difficulties and currently the future of these windows (the largest work ever undertaken by the artist Jonah Jones) hangs in the balance.
Personally I hope they can be saved, admittedly I have an emotional attachment having grown up here, but I also consider them a rare period piece, a bold expression of the kind of optimism and vision that gave us Coventry Cathedral (a mere 12 miles away) and Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, both of which are accepted as iconic statements of their time, despite the general unpopularity of the architecture of the time.
Any information on how to proceed with saving these precarious artworks will be most gratefully recieved.
For more information on the artist Jonah Jones see the following website dedicated to his life and work
Broken Panel Fragments
Fallen fragments of the west window at English Martyrs church photographed on April 11th 2010, The defective upper central transom broke free the previous morning, sending the stained glass/dalle de verre panel above it crashing to the ground where it shattered on the grass below.
It is now clear that the major factor in the declining condition of this window is the poor load bearing capacity of the concrete transoms and their weak connection to the main mullions. The lowest row of panels are bowed and sagging precariously as a result of the weak structure supporting them. Thus the poor condition of the window is as much a failure of the architectural design as much as the nature of the glazing.
Hillmorton's Roman Catholic church of the English Martyrs was built in 1965 (architects Sandy & Norris) with a square core surmounted by an expanse if coloured glass on all four sides forming a lantern, and capped by a concrete vaulted ceiling. Below it was envisaged that four limbs would sprout from this nucleus to form a cross, though in the event only one was built to the north, which served as the nave until the church was re-orientated in the early 1980s when a new sanctuary extension was added to the east.(the old nave being walled off and serving as the church hall ever since). The remaining two temporary walls below the vast windows were finished in brick only in 1990.
The major artistic feature of the building is the enormous expanse of stained glass by noted Welsh artist Jonah Jones, executed in the dalle de verre ('slab of glass') technique popular in the 1950s & 60s, with heavy chunks of glass set in a resin matrix (in place of traditional lead, which would be insufficient to hold such thick pieces of glass). The design of the four windows is abstract, though each incorporates a subtle crown of thorns motif in red glass.
However, times have changed and the dalle de verre technique has not stood the test of time well. Though the east and north windows remain in sound condition those on the south and particularly the west have suffered from the effects of heat expansion which has caused several of the glass pieces to detach from their resin matrix, whilst in the worst cases the resin structure itself is failing, in places cracked and bowing dangerously. Finding a remedy to these problems seems to be frought with difficulties and currently the future of these windows (the largest work ever undertaken by the artist Jonah Jones) hangs in the balance.
Personally I hope they can be saved, admittedly I have an emotional attachment having grown up here, but I also consider them a rare period piece, a bold expression of the kind of optimism and vision that gave us Coventry Cathedral (a mere 12 miles away) and Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, both of which are accepted as iconic statements of their time, despite the general unpopularity of the architecture of the time.
Any information on how to proceed with saving these precarious artworks will be most gratefully recieved.
For more information on the artist Jonah Jones see the following website dedicated to his life and work