You may wonder how I happened to choose that topic as what I knew about stained glass would fit on a postage stamp. I’d originally started a completely different book – or rather two completely different books – a fourth book in my Across the Seas series or a fifth in the Penang series. But I couldn’t get started. I needed a complete change of scene and period. I’m sure I’ll return to these as I have lots of ideas for them but – writer’s privilege – I wanted to tackle something completely different first. But what?

My friend Lorna Fergusson who runs the Fiction Fire writing consultancy (and edited Jasmine in Paris) saw me struggling with putting fingers to keyboard when we were on our November writing retreat. Lorna suggested I try a writing prompt. She pulled a couple of ancient books off the shelf at Goddards where we were staying and opened them on random pages. This is what she read out to me:

“Mrs Bowyer, a breathless fussy, little woman”

“Stained glass”

“Albert Dock, Liverpool”

and “Norwich cathedral”

I immediately set aside Albert Dock as I’ve already written three books and a short story featuring the Liverpool docks. But fussy Mrs Bowyer and the stained glass remained – as did the idea of churches if not specifically Norwich Cathedral.. As soon as I got home, I invested in these magnificent and lavishly illustrated books and immersed myself in stained glass. I was hooked.

Harry Clarke, the Irish master of the craft, had made a series of windows for a chapel in a convent about forty miles away from my home. Imagine my delight when the place turned out to be a country house hotel (complete with spa). I booked myself in for an overnight stay – checking first that there were no functions taking place in the former chapel which housed Harry’s windows and which is now used for weddings and other events.

But first, a little about Harry Clarke. He was one of the most renowned stained glass artists in the Arts & Crafts movement and was born in Dublin on St Patrick’s day in 1889. Harry’s father, Joshua, had a church decorating business which in 1892 expanded into stained glass. Harry’s mother died at only 43, when he was just 14. Both Harry and his older brother Walter inherited her poor health and chest complaintsand both brothers joined the family business, Harry in 1905 after abandoning plans to become an architect. As well as being apprenticed in his father’s studio, Harry studied at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art and won numerous prizes for his stained glass.

In 1913 he moved to London where he focussed on book illustration, winning commissions from Harrap to illustrate Hans Christian Andersen’s Fairy Tales.

Images: Harry Clarke, Wikimedia; Fairy Tales and Little Mermaid, public domain via Wikimedia Commons

He also travelled to France to see the stained glass in Chartres cathedral. But with the outbreak of war, the poor supply of lead and glass affected business in London and Harry returned to his father’s studio in Dublin to work on Irish window commissions, while still illustrating for Harrap. The 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin happened close to the studio and Harry and his colleagues were trapped inside for four days and the blocks for his illustrations to The Rime of the Ancient Mariner were destroyed. Joshua suffered ill health and in 1921 died, so Harry took over the stained-glass business, while Walter ran the general and ecclesiastical decoration side. Throughout the early 1920s he accepted numerous prestigious commissions from places as far-flung as Brisbane Cathedral in Australia (1923) and the commission from the nuns of Ashdown Park – then the Convent of Notre Dame, in 1925.

One of Harry’s most important but fateful commissions came from the Irish government in 1925 – to create a window for the International Labour Court in Geneva, depicting scenes from Irish literary figures such as Yeats and Joyce. The design featured scantily clad women and extracts from writings considered decadent by the Irish Church and State. As a result, the window was never installed, and the Irish government only settled the bill after Clarke’s death. The window was locked away until Clarke’s widow bought it back. His sons eventually sold it to an art collector – it is now in the Wolfsonian Museum in Miami Beach.

But I am jumping ahead. The saddest part of the story is that this genius lived a very short life. Dogged by ill-health and overwork, Harry struggled to complete works, in the face of growing demand from as far afield as the USA – the Basilica of St Vincent de Paul in Bayonne New Jersey (1928). Diagnosed with consumption, he travelled to Davos in Switzerland to seek a cure in a sanatorium – while still working on designs. After he returned to Dublin in 1930 he was met with a huge backlog of work. A couple of months later tragedt struck with the sudden death of brother, Walter, from pneumonia. Later that year Harry returned to Davos as his own health was worsening, but fearing he would die in a foreign country he decided to return to Dublin> He never made it: at only 41 years old he died in Coire, Switzerland. His wife Margaret travelled out for his funeral and erected a simple headstone. But, as is also the custom in France, Switzerland places newspaper ads after 15 years to enquire whether a grave is still to be maintained. Harry’s Dublin-based family never saw the ad, so his body was disinterred in 1945, placed in an unmarked communal grave and his headstone destroyed. A sad and ironic fate for a man who left so many stunningly beautiful windows throughout the world.

I felt privileged to see the lancet windows at Ashdown. The predominant colour of blue is reported to consist of over 35 different shades. The effect as I stood alone in the late afternoon of a sunny day was awe-inspiring. If you ever get a chance to look at a Harry Clarke window, grab it. They are some of the finest examples of stained glass produced during the 20th century – including those of Bewley’s of Grafton Street – the coffee house which is a must for everyone who visits Dublin.

The stained-glass artist of my yet-to-be-written book is not Harry Clarke. I am not writing a biography but a work of fiction. Harry is one of several sources of inspiration for my Arts & Crafts window man. But looking closely at Harry’s work – and that of other acclaimed artists will fuel my imagination for my own character – Edmund Cutler. My Edmund is from London and was born a little earlier than Harry – in 1884. And that’s all I’m ready to reveal right now.