Stained Glass banner image

Featured Window

Window of the Month
Our Lady of Grace, Dearborn Heights, Michigan

Click any image to enlarge.




Window

Building Name: St. John's Episcopal Church

Studio Name: Tiffany Studios

City: Detroit

Window Shape: 5 (gothic arched, 2 vertical sections)

Date of Window: 1898

Subject/Title of Window: Saint Agnes

Brief Description of Subject: The grisaille glass in the upper part of the window is original to the window, and at one time, extended to the bottom. In their book "Detroit's Historic Places of Worship," Collum, Krueger, and Kostuch, thought the maker was likely Friederichs and Staffin (Detroit Stained Glass Works). In the canopy, the roundel features an hourglass with wings --- symbolizing time flies and death comes too soon for us all.

The original grisaille glass in the lower portion of this window was replaced in 1898 by the scene of a seated St. Agnes holding a lamb and reading a book surrounded by cherubs. The cherubs were drawn in soft focus to give a sense of depth.

St. Agnes lived during the time of the Diocletian persecutions. A son of a Roman official fell in love with her, but she refused to marry him, telling him her only love would be Christ. Spurned, he denounced her as a Christian and she was martyred. The exact origin of a lamb as an attribute for St. Agnes is unknown. St. Augustine thought that "Agnes" meant "lamb" in Latin. St. Ambrose said that St. Agnes was meek and mild like a lamb. Possibly it came from the legend that after her death, her parents saw her standing with a lamb. Her attribute of an open book stems from her devotion to the teachings of Christ.

The scene of St. Agnes was designed by Frederick Wilson for Tiffany Studios. A close look at the face of St. Agnes illustrates the comment in "Style, Status, and Religion: America's Pictorial Windows 1840 - 1950" by Virginia Chieffo Raguin that "Wilson's work is visible in the elegant Pre-Raphaelite style of facial types, with long slender noses, broad foreheads, high cheek bones, and invariably reddish tonality to hair."

The maker's signature appears at the bottom right of the window as:
Copyright 1897
Tiffany Glass & Decorating Company
New York

The "1897" refers to when Frederick Wilson completed a design for a Tiffany St. Agnes window. When a client selected this particular design, it would then have to be modified to fit the shape and dimensions of the client's window.

Inscriptions: In loving memory of Jeanie Rosaline Paine


Condition of Window: good

Height: ~18'

Width: 4'

Saint Agnes
Saint Agnes
Saint Agnes canopy
Saint Agnes canopy
Grisaille glass by Friederichs and Staffin
Grisaille glass by Friederichs and Staffin
Saint Agnes by Tiffany Studios
Saint Agnes by Tiffany Studios
Saint Agnes detail
Saint Agnes detail
Tiffany signature
Tiffany signature
Saint Agnes outside
Saint Agnes outside

The MSGC is a constantly evolving database. Not all the data that has been collected by volunteers has been sorted and entered. Not every building has been completely documented.

All images in the Index are either born-digital photographs of windows or buildings or are scans of slides, prints, or other published sources. These images have been provided by volunteers and the quality of the material varies widely.

If you have any questions, additions or corrections, or think you can provide better images and are willing to share them, please contact donald20@msu.edu