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Alternative designs

Using the collage process, and playing around with it, I eventually came up with 4 designs that I was happy to present to members of the school and church.

The key for me was to have a design that drew your eye across the height of the window. I have, hopefully, achieved this through the use of a central motif, which also echoes the iron bar that runs centrally in the windows either side.

The top left design uses sewing, and specifically the ‘corset stitch’ to represent Carolines work with and for female immigrants.

The central design uses a cross to symbolise Carolines faith- a driving force behind her humanitarian work.

The bottom design uses the ribbon motif to again symbolise her work with female immigrants, but is slightly offset against an alternative background design.

The design process

Using the collages of the student designs, and a cut out of the window, I was able to play around with variations on a theme to find the most interesting compositions.

I planned to use the student designs for the main body of the window, visually tying them together with one main feature down the middle. This feature would symbolise Caroline Chisholms work in some way.

Holy Sepulchre Church

Holy Sepulchre is a Grade 1 listed church in the heart of Northampton, and is one of only a handful of Norman round churches left in the country. The window is to be sited in the central light of a 3 light window that faces south west, in the round part of the church as shown in the images. X marks the spot!

The church has a wealth of stained glass windows including examples by Hardman Studios, C E Kempe, Mayer and Burlison & Grylls so it will be a privilege to have a window amongst such esteemed company.

The Design

As you can see the student designs are incredibly impressive! Fantastic colours and some recurring themes and images.

To create something from all these variations would take a bit of thinking but I finally came up with the option of collage. This is method I haven’t used for a window design since my college days but it seemed the most appropriate way of using as many different designs as possible to create one cohesive window.

I photocopied all of the designs and started to place them in all manner of ways – even weaving them together, as shown in the image. This appeared to work as it showed elements of different designs and allowed me to move things around without having to redraw anything!

Creating a design

Caroline Chisholm was born in Wootton, Northampton in 1808. Well known in Australia for her humanitarian work for women and child Immigrants to that country in the 19th century, it was decided that the town of her birth should also have a memorial to commemorate her work. As she was married in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre it was decided a stained glass window situated there would be most appropriate.

A selected group of Gifted and Talented students from Caroline Chisholm School, Northampton were asked to create their own designs as a response to the life work of Caroline Chisholm. The designs created represent the ideas of travel, hardship, loneliness, education and improvement in social conditions and life outlook. These are all themes associated with the work and life of Caroline Chisholm, and are represented through the use of colour and symbolism. The designs are shown in the image.