The British Society of Master Glass Painters

As the name suggests, this was originally a guild-like society, founded in 1921 by professional stained-glass artists to promote good practice and maintain high standards of design and workmanship. As regular church visitors will know, not every example of stained glass to be found in our places of worship is of equal merit; for every luminous and jewel-like work by Edward Burne-Jones or Charles Kempe, there are as many examples of the garish colour and clumsy draughtsmanship that the society’s founding members abhorred. Dating from the 1880s, the south aisle of St Cuthbert’s Church in London has scenes from the life of the saint and legendary inventor of golf, made by Charles Tute (