Stained Glass Template

Last year I was approached by Mr. & Mrs. Joe McDonald for a special commission. They had seen me paint live at Taylor & Tyler's wedding and needed my help for a project of their own. They are the Aunt and Uncle of the groom who wanted to make a custom stained glass work of art as their post-nuptial gift to the couple. Joe is a very skilled stained glass maker and requested that I create a template for them to work from.

We met to discuss the idea of the stained glass piece and we went over examples of works that they liked. We talked about form and how that played into creating a piece of stained glass artwork. It was very helpful to learn more about the process since I have never made stained glass before. Ultimately, they needed a simplistic drawing, to scale, that they could use to cut out and trace onto the glass for cutting.

Since their wedding day was extremely rainy, the McDonald's wanted to create a colorful image that would include the farm and barn where they were married. I used reference pictures from Taylor & Tyler's engagement session along with pictures of their backs from their wedding day (below) to create the composition. I started by creating a small 4" x 6" sketch of the design. I then enlarged it to the requested size: 12" x 18". I left the design simple so that Joe could make decisions as to where to add extra pieces.

It was so much fun to be able to help the McDonald's create another unique piece of art for Taylor and Taylor. Below is the finished piece. I'd love to know what you think of the process, please leave me a comment!

Photo courtesy of Dana Zarin Photography © 2017

Photo courtesy of Dana Zarin Photography © 2017

Photo courtesy of Dana Zarin Photography © 2017

Template I made for the stained glass

Finished stained glass work of art by Joe McDonald