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Barnby Village Sign

Featuring the Margaret Rope Window. 1963 from St John the Baptist Church, Barnby, Suffolk.

 

The two stained glass artists named Margaret Rope were first cousins, granddaughters of George Rope of Grove Farm, Blaxhall, Suffolk (1814-1912) and his wife Anne (née Pope) (29/3/1821-1/10/1882). Neither married: both were baptised Anglicans but died Roman Catholics.

 

The younger Margaret was the 5th child of Arthur Mingay Rope (himself George and Anne's 5th child: 1850-1945) and Agnes Maud (née Aldrich: 1855-1943). She was born on 29th July 1891 and christened Margaret Edith at St Margaret's Church, Leiston, Suffolk on 25th August. She died in March 1988.

 

Born into a farming family at Leiston on the Suffolk coast, Margaret Edith Rope found herself among artistic relatives at Leiston and Blaxhall, Suffolk: her uncle, George Thomas Rope, landscape painter and Royal Academician; her aunt Ellen Mary, sculptor; sister Dorothy, also a sculptor. In the family, her nickname was "Tor", for tortoise. She was later to use a tortoise to sign some of her windows.

 

She was first educated by an aunt and later at Wimbledon High School, Chelsea School of Art and LCC Central School of Arts & Crafts (where she specialised in stained glass under Karl Parsons & Alfred J. Drury).

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Uploaded on September 30, 2018
Taken on September 27, 2018