Leadlights!

So I have been working hard for a year and a half trying to deliver my leadlight project. I've already described the process so this is just the "look what I did" blog.

A reminder of the original concept: And this is what we had before. Someone has replaced top right and top left with chipboard panels and painted the centre top glass a khaki green colour (why?!?) So light in the hall was a bit limited.Here's the view from the outside. The leadlight teacher reckons it was once all coloured glass panels which probably became broken and were never replaced.

So after 1.5 years I finally finished! Here is Greg the leadlight teacher having removed all the glass and chipboard from the door. Much more light. The chipboard panels top left and right were full of borer.

Leadlight 1 goes in.

And the end result - by day from the far end of the hall. Lets in much more light which is great.

By night viewed from the outside:And from up a ladder:
So overall this is about 120 hours work. I got much much faster as I went along and if I did it again I could probably do it in about 80 or so. Greg says he'd knock it out in 40.

The toughest panels were top right and left, the flowers were really difficult to get to fit together. The side panels were also challenging but I had got more skilled by then I think. Though we did smash a couple of the internal glass panes after the leadlight was put together by being too rough with it which wasted a lot of time in fixing them.

Total costs:

Leadlight courses: 6 * $180 = $1080

Lead: about $350

Glass: $460

Tools, stationery, cement etc: $130

Solder: $60

Total costs: about $2080

Greg says to commission this set would cost about $7000 so considerable saving by DIYing. But then again my time is precious too.

I may still do a matching panel for the door, but haven't decided what it should be yet. Let me know what you think!

But first I want to have a little break and focus on wallpaper stripping. :-)