I love leaded glass, especially in exterior transom windows of old storefronts. The transom above our front door is a leaded glass window (albeit new) and I love it. I WISH our house had some original leaded glass, but alas all we have are energy efficient double pane windows. I know, I am the only person on earth who complains about how energy efficient her house is…
We looked into getting some real leaded glass for the storefront window transoms, but it was darn near impossible, and pretty much a huge waste of money as our current windows are perfectly fine. The problem is however, that once I get an idea into my head I am not easily dissuaded. So I started researching for a solution and came across this:
Pebeo Vitrail lead adhesive strips. It’s used for faking your own stained glass. They have a line of glass paints, and you literally make your design out of this tape, then fill it in with the glass paint.
I didn’t want the stained glass look, but the lead looked like a pretty cool idea. So I popped into every art store I came across, and on my third try I managed to find a package. It was $24 for 33 feet. I thought that would be plenty for my project and headed home.
I then did some research for leaded glass patterns.
We narrowed it down to either a Diamond pattern, or a Regent pattern. I drew both out to the size of our transom windows, and once drawn out, we liked the Regent the best.
I headed outside and thoroughly cleaned the windows and then taped my drawn out pattern on the inside of the window. I then set to re-create the pattern on the outside of the window. It was a bit tricky due to the space between the front pane of glass and the back one where the pattern was. If I change the angle I was looking at the window it changed the pattern. I tried hard to keep it straight and true but alas its a bit crooked. Shh don’t tell.
The adhesive leaded glass was very easy to cut, but the backing wasn’t that sticky. You really need to burnish it in place with the provided application tool to make sure it stays where its supposed to. Once I got into the swing of things my lines became straighter and my cuts more precise. Just as I was fining the first of two windows I noticed that I was dangerously low on adhesive lead! Eeep. Apparently 33 feet doesn’t go that far when you have an intricate pattern. So I was unable to finish both windows, so for now I have one leaded glass transom window. What do you think?
