Robert Anning Bell and Lowndes & Drury, chancel east window (1917), Church of St Pol de Léon, Paul, Nr Penzance, Cornwall.

Photo: Peter Hildebrand

Robert Anning Bell and Lowndes & Drury, detail of chancel east window (1917), Church of St Pol de Léon, Paul, Nr Penzance, Cornwall.

Photo: Peter Hildebrand

Church of St Pol de Léon, Paul, Nr Penzance, Cornwall

Address

Church of St Pol de Léon, Paul, Nr Penzance, Cornwall TR19 6TZ

Recommended by

Michael Swift (10)

Highlight

Chancel east window

Artist, maker and date

Reason for highlighting

An outstanding example of an Arts & Crafts design unmatched in the Southwest. Striking iconography, including Arthurian subjects and a First World War scene of a battlefield.

Other comments

The window commemorates the life of Lieutenant William Torquill Macleod Bolitho, who is also remembered in a window made the previous year by A.A. Orr for the Church of St John the Baptist, Leusdon, Devon. It contains many of the same themes as this window.

A different style of Arts & Crafts window, created by Louis Davis in 1928, and given in memory of Lieut. Bolitho’s aunt, Catherine Bolitho can be seen in the Church of St Mary with St Andrew, Rockbeare, Devon.

Further details and images see: Cornish Stained Glass – Paul, St Pol de Leon church – Bolitho war memorial

Artist/maker notes

Robert Anning Bell (1863-1933) British painter, sculptor, designer, illustrator, and teacher, born in London. His studies included time at Westminster College and the Royal Academy Schools. He combined his design work with teaching, including time at the Glasgow School of Art and Royal College of Art.

Source: Robert Anning Bell on Wikipedia

Lowndes & Drury was formed in 1897, by the artist Mary Lowndes (1857-1929) and the craftsman Alfred John Drury (1868-1940), with the aim of providing facilities for independent artists to design and make stained glass windows. They moved from cramped conditions in Chelsea to newly purpose-built premises, The Glass House, Fulham in 1906. The firm continued after the founders’ deaths, under Alfred Drury’s son, Victor, until he retired in the early 1970s. However, The Glass House premises continued in use under Carl Edwards and subsequently his daughter, Caroline Benyon, until she moved her studio to Hampton in 1992.

Source: The Journal of Stained Glass, Vol. XLI, 2017