Richmond, Sir William Blake

Sir William Blake Richmond and James Powell & Sons, detail of Lady Chapel window (1910), Church of the Holy and Undivided Trinity with Saint Jude, Sloane Street, London.
Photo: Peter Hildebrand

Sir William Blake Richmond KCB, RA (1842-1921) was an English portrait painter, sculptor and a designer of stained glass and mosaic. He is best known for his portrait work and decorative mosaics in St Paul’s Cathedral in London.

Richmond was influential in the early stages of the Arts and Crafts Movement in his selection of bold colours and materials for the mosaics in St. Paul’s Cathedral and in his collaboration with James Powell and Sons, glass makers, in creating new colours and materials. This new material expanded the glassmaker’s palette and was favoured by artists of the Arts and Crafts Movement, primarily in the creation of stained glass windows and decorative art work. Richmond was the Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Oxford from 1878 to 1883, succeeding his friend and mentor John Ruskin.

Source: Sir William Blake Richmond on Wikipedia