Programme
0900    Registration & Coffee
0945    St Laurence, Ludlow in Context - Bridget Cherry
1015    The Tree of Jesse Window - Prof. Tim Ayers
1100    Coffee
1130    Liturgy and the Laity: an Exploration of the Catechism Windows -  Emma Woolfrey
1215    Telling Tales in Stained Glass: The Adventures of the Palmers’ Guild - Dr Christian Liddy
1300    Buffet Lunch with plenty of time to look around the church or walk around Ludlow
1430    Gothic Revival to Arts and Crafts: The 19th and 20th Century Windows -  Dr. Jasmine Allen
1515    Past Histories, Future Challenges: The Conservation of the Ludlow Windows -Sarah Brown
1600    Concluding Remarks

Tickets
£50   standard price
£45   for local residents and members of supporting organisations
£40   for Ludlow Palmers

Booking
1.         Either online at http://ludlowglass@eventbrite.co.uk - when booking, check the list of supporting organisations to see whether you qualify for the reduced price
2.         Or by sending a cheque made payable to 'CTSLL' to The Ludlow Palmers, 2 College Street, Ludlow SY8 1AN - don't forget to include full contact details
Parking & Accommodation
Information about parking and accommodation will be sent to all non-local participants
Subjects and Speakers
For detailed information about the subjects of talks and the speakers, please see the succeeding pages
The Ludlow Palmers raise money for the Conservation Trust for St Laurence, Ludlow
which is an independent  secular charity with registration number 1114678
 

 
St Laurence, Ludlow in Context
The  remarkable late medieval glass  in St Laurence Ludlow belongs to a church which was  already substantial in the  twelfth century  but which was extensively rebuilt  in the fifteenth century, benefitting from the prosperity which the town enjoyed through the wool and cloth trade.  St Laurence was the town’s single parish church; its tall central tower dominates the town, an important fortified centre  in the unsettled Welsh border.  This introductory talk will examine the architectural and historical context of the surviving stained glass.
Bridget Cherry is an architectural historian who previously worked on the Pevsner Architectural Guides. She now lives near Ludlow.

The Tree of Jesse Window
The tree has long been a powerful metaphor, and a way of organizing information visually. The Tree of Jesse became a popular subject in English monumental art from the 12th century, resonant with ideas about Christ's royal descent, his fulfilment of prophecy and the promise of salvation in life-giving fruitfulness.
Prof. Tim Ayers is a stained glass historian in the History of Art department at the University of York, and Vice President of the international Corpus Vitrearum. He is currently working on a project to publish the medieval fabric accounts for St Stephen's Chapel in the Palace of Westminster.  
 
Liturgy and the Laity: an exploration of the Catechism Windows
St Laurence is a remarkable example of the 15th century process of church adornment as it was the sole parish church to serve the town and thus attracted all parish investments and donations, including those from the renowned Palmers' Guild. Yet in what way did this relationship between the church of St Laurence and its parishioners affect the images with which it was imbued? Through focusing on St Laurence's fifteenth century catechism windows, this paper will explore how the images of the parish church can be utilised as a means of examining the relationship of the laity not only with their local parish but with the institution of the Church itself.
Emma Woolfrey is in the initial year of her PhD with the History of Art Department at the University of York studying the late medieval stained glass of the Benedictine Order in England. This interest in stained glass was discovered during her studies for a BA in History of Art at the same university which led on to a MA in Stained Glass Conservation and Heritage Management completed last year.

Telling Tales in Stained Glass: The Adventures of the Palmers’ Guild
In 1997 Dr Liddy wrote an article about the Palmers' window. Nearly twenty years later, much more work has been published on the rich material culture of late medieval English fraternities. At the same time, there has been considerable academic interest in the subject of memory and commemoration in late medieval England, and the study of church monuments is no longer the preserve of antiquarians. This talk will offer some new ideas on the meaning and importance of the Palmers' window in the light of recent scholarship.
Dr Christian Liddy is Senior Lecturer in the Department of History at the University of Durham. He specialises in late medieval British history and has a particular interest in urban history. He is the author of a forthcoming book, The Politics of Citizenship in Late Medieval English Towns, which will be published by OUP.
 
Gothic Revival to Arts and Crafts: The 19th and 20th Century Windows
The modern stained glass windows of Ludlow parish church present an equally interesting insight into the history of Ludlow as do their medieval counterparts. Many of the windows were given by local patrons during restoration campaigns or in memory of loved ones. From the great west window (1859) by ‘the Father of Victorian Stained Glass’ Thomas Willement to the Arts and Crafts memorial windows by Louis Davis (1920s), we will explore the styles, subjects and stories of these windows and place them in a broader historical context of the revival of stained glass in the 19th and 20th century.
Dr Jasmine Allen is Curator of The Stained Glass Museum, Ely, the only Museum dedicated to stained glass in the UK. She received her doctorate in 2013 from the University of York on the topic of 19th century stained glass at the International Exhibitions and is currently preparing a monograph on this subject.

Past Histories, Future Challenges: The Conservation of the Ludlow Windows
This presentation will summarise the past restoration programmes that have bequeathed the Ludlow windows in their current state. The work of past restorers, including Betton & Evans and Hardman & Co., will be explained in the context of English nineteenth-century glazing practice. The implications of these past interventions for the future of the windows will be explored, together with the options available to conservators of the 21st century. These issues will be illustrated with comparable examples for projects in the UK and further afield, placing the challenges and opportunities for stained glass conservation at Ludlow in a national perspective.
Sarah Brown is currently Director of the country's oldest and largest stained glass conservation team, the York Glaziers Trust. She combines this role with that of Course Director of the University of York's innovative MA in Stained Glass Conservation, the only course of its kind in the English -speaking world. She has published on the history and conservation of stained glass of all periods.
 
ST LAURENCE'S
College Street,
Ludlow, Shropshire, SY8 1AN, United Kingdom
+44 1584 872073
stlaurences.org.uk