Tiffany glass in Toronto

[Urban Shocker]

The former, I suspect. Torontonians had been installing locally produced stained glass, and imported European glass, in our churches for decades before Tiffany came along in the 1880s. The chancel windows at St. James, for instance, were installed by the Franz Mayer Company of Munich over the period between 1882-1893.

Here's ROM curator Corey Keeble on the subject:

"The development of nineteenth century stained glass
in Toronto took place in the context of the Gothic Revival
in architecture. Rudimentary efforts had been made in the
1830s and 1840s, but assumed greater maturity with the
efforts of Joseph McCausland in the 1850s. The
McCausland studio not only pursued its own course of
evolution, but provided the training ground for
generations of artists and craft specialists who began to set
up their own studios. Among them was Napoleon
Theodore Lyon who was associated with Joseph
McCausland as early as 1868, and who had set up his own
independent stained glass design studio in the 1880s.
N. T. Lyon’s studio flourished until the end of the 1920s,
and succumbed to the tribulations of the Great
Depression of the 1930s. At the end, the Lyon studio was
absorbed back into the McCausland firm, in this case the
firm of Robert McCausland Ltd, which owed its name to
Joseph McCausland’s son Robert, one of the greatest
pioneers and practitioners of the art of stained glass in
Canadian history."

( quoted from this website):

http://www.stbarnabas-toronto.com/pdf/StBarnabas_StainedGlass_KCoreyKeeble.pdf

http://www.stbarnabas-toronto.com/pages/stainedglass.html

 

[Urban Shocker]

I think that then, as now, Toronto absorbed influences from a variety of sources. In addition to the American Tiffany window in the Cathedral, there are window designs in several churches influenced by British designers such as William Morris ( All Saints at Dundas and Sherborne, designed in 1874, has some lovely examples with a Pre-Raphaelite aesthetic ):

http://allisonlynn.blogspot.com/2011/05/morning-at-all-saints-toronto.html

Here's the website for Holy Trinity's windows, which indicates that one was produced in1858 by Ballantyne & Allen of Edinburgh, Scotland:

http://www.yorku.ca/rsgc/HolyTrinity.html

 

[Urban Shocker]

St. Michael's Cathedral ( built in the 1840s ) also contains windows from a range of non-American sources. The largest piece of stained glass, located on the east side of the building was imported from France in 1858 and created by Étienne Thévenot, the same artist who created some of the windows for Notre Dame and various other churches in Paris. The stained-glass windows located on the north and south walls originate from Austria and Bavaria and were installed during the late 1800s and early 1900s replacing the original clear panes.

Thévenot's window:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Cathedral_Toronto.jpg

Local firms are credited with windows at St. Stephen-in-the-Fields ( rebuilt after 1865 ) on College Street, in this City of Toronto designation:

"St. Stephen-in-the-Fields Anglican Church contains an important collection of commemorative
stained glass windows by artisans from three Toronto firms. Robert McCausland Limited installed
the trio of windows on the north face of the north transept (chapel) in the late 19th century. In 1913,
McCausland designed the large west window inscribed “noli me tangere” above the
Bellevue Avenue entrance. The same firm added a panel depicting a pair of angels on the east wall
of the north transept in 1919. The Dominion Stained Glass Studio is credited with the design of a
window on the same wall. The N. T. Lyon Studio created the tripartite east (chancel) window in the
late 1800s, as well as a panel on the south wall of the sanctuary in the early 20th century."

and ...

"Stained Glass“Glass typical of the period from the 1860s to the 1880s is preserved in the North Transept of St. Stephen-in-the-Fields at 103 Bellevue Avenue on the South side of College Street. St. Stephen’s, originally built in 1858 to designs by Thomas Fuller, was rebuilt in 1865 by Gundry and Langley after a fire. According to Patricia McHugh, the transepts were added in 1878, but the glass in this triple lancet of the North transept perpetuates the type of stencilled quarry glass with emblems which had already existed in Toronto from the late 1850s and 1860s. The triple lancet on the North wall of the transept contains stencilled quarry glass with patterns of trefoil leaves and beaded borders, and diagonal bands of stencilled texts from Scripture. It also contains emblems such as the chalice with grapes and wheat symbolic of the wine and break of the Eucharist.

St. Stephen’s contains an impressive East window in the chancel typical of the work of N.T. Lyon of the 1880s-1890s, and a West window of 1912 by McCausland related in style and subject to the West window at All Saints’ Church, Sherbourne and Dundas Streets.”

— Stained Glass Tour of Toronto, Hall/Keeble

 

[thecharioteer]

Just returned from a visit to the Corning Museum of Glass (Corning, New York) which has this stunning 1905 Tiffany window:

From the museum website http://www.cmog.org/dynamic.aspx?id=3380:

Stained glass was an essential component of American sacred and secular architecture at the start of the 20th century. The industry was fueled both by the economic boom of the 1870s and by the building of many churches at that time. Louis Comfort Tiffany was internationally known for his stained glass windows, and his Tiffany Studios produced hundreds of them. Although the majority of these windows depict religious themes, the landscape windows best illustrate Tiffany’s range as a designer. He was commissioned by Melchior S. Beltzhoover to design this large window for the music room of Rochroane, a Gothic Revival mansion built in Irvington-on-Hudson, New York. The window depicts the Hudson River landscape as seen from Rochroane’s hilltop location. The river vista is framed by hollyhocks, clematis, and trumpet vines. By 1970, when Rochroane was donated to the Roman Catholic Church, most of the decorations and furnishings, including this window, had been removed and sold.


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[thecharioteer]

From: http://www.mountainsideunited.ca/glass.html

Sadly, Tiffany lived to see Art Nouveau both flourish and wither. Around 1915, the stark functionalism called 'modernism' began to replace the sensually elegant, flowing and natural forms of the style he did so much to create. His vast output became an object of public indifference and many of his great stained-glass windows were destroyed, dismantled and dispersed. In New York city alone, more than half the windows produced by Tiffany Studios have been destroyed. By 1927, the company had virtually ceased to exist, although the production of church windows continued until 1938, when the firm was finally liquidated. Tiffany died in 1933, a lonely man whose work, at the time, was completely disregarded.

The re-emergence of Art Nouveau began in the mid-1950's and brought a timely reappraisal of the work of this elegant American. His art is now being presented in museums and galleries around the world and is considered to be among the most beautiful creations of the Art Nouveau movement.

The windows in the present Erskine and American Church were originally installed by Tiffany Studios in 1902 in the American Presbyterian Church on Dorchester Street in Montreal. In 1934, this Church amalgamated with the Erskine Church which had been erected in 1894 on Sherbrooke Street West. In 1938, Percy Nobbs, an architect at McGill University, was chosen to plan extensive renovations to the building and the original Tiffany windows were moved at this time to the newly renovated church. They now comprise one of the largest collections of religious stained glass from the Tiffany Studios.

 

[Urban Shocker]

How sad when examples of important design are lost in this way - either to the forces of expediency ( all those Wren churches that the Victorians demolished in London ... ) or as a result of people who must keep up with changing fashions and are blind to everything else.