Stained glass: The Victorian context

Christ Church, St Kilda, is linked with the very foundation of the craft of glass staining in Victoria in a way which is not generally known. In 1858 a Bourke Street plumber, called Eden. volunteered to glaze all the windows of this church at his own expense, the principal ones in stained g lass suited to C. R. Swyer's architecture.' Whether in fact he did any glazing I do not know. though obviously none survives. If Eden planned to import the stained glass it would have been amongst the earliest examples in the colony. If he planned to make it, or have it made locally. it would have been the first known example of Australian glass staining. Outside Victoria, Edmund Blacket had painted imitation stained g lass for St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney, and in South Australia, Edward Brooks had made a window in Christ Church, North Ade laide, of 1856, which does not survive. The latter would not have been true stained glass. as Brooks made only patterns of coloured and nashed g lass, though he later incorporated imported painted medallions.