Mary Lowndes (1857–1929) was a British stained-glass artist who co-founded the stained glass studio and workshop

Lowndes and Drury The Glass House building was a "purpose-built stained-glass studio and workshop" for stained glass artists in Fulham, London. Having gone into partnership in 1897, Mary Lowndes and Alfred Drury had The Glass House built in 1906 for use by indepen ...

in 1897. She was an influential leader in the Arts and Crafts movement, not only for her stained glass work and successful studio-workshop, but also for opening doors for other women stained glass artists. She was an active participant in the

suffragette A suffragette was a member of an activist women's organisation in the early 20th century who, under the banner "Votes for Women", fought for the right to vote in public elections in the United Kingdom. The term refers in particular to member ...

movement, acting as Chair of the

Artists' Suffrage League The Artists' Suffrage League (ASL) (1907–c.1918) was a suffrage society formed to change parliamentary opinion and engage in public demonstrations and other propaganda activities. Activities The ASL was established in Jan 1907 to assist with ...

, and creating poster art to assist the movement.

Early life and work

M Lowndes St Andrew, Meonstoke, Hampshire

She was born in 1857, the daughter of Richard Lowndes, the rector of St Mary's Church, Sturminster Newton in

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of , ...

, and his wife Annie Harriet Kaye. She received her art training at the

Slade School of Fine Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised a ...

in London. When Lowndes completed her art classes, she became an assistant to prominent stained glass designer,

Henry Holiday Henry Holiday (17 June 183915 April 1927) was a British historical genre and landscape painter, stained-glass designer, illustrator, and sculptor. He is part of the Pre-Raphaelite school of art. Life Early years and training Holiday was born ...

. She worked at his studio-workshop where she drew cartoons (designs) for stained glass commissions. While working for Holiday, Lowndes taught herself the techniques of stained glass. The first window she painted was a two-light window titled "Feed my sheep", completed in 1893 for St. Peter's church, Hinton St. Mary, Dorset. Lowndes lived and worked in Chelsea, where she had her own studio to work on designs, but there was no workshop nearby to complete her stained glass work. She would travel to

Southwark Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed ...

, to the Britten and Gilson studio-workshop, where she would select the coloured glass for her commissions, paint the glass and supervise the firing and glazing of the windows. Lowdes worked as a stained glass designer for James Powell & Sons from 1887 to 1892. Lowndes was one of the first women to work professionally in stained glass in the 1890s. "Women, generally amateurs, might occasionally design windows and even take some part in their execution, but they rarely if ever practiced the whole art independently as a full time professional occupation".

Lowndes and Drury

While working at the Britten and Gilson workshop, Lowndes met renowned stained glass artist Christopher Whall. Lowndes admired his innovative stained glass, and her early work shows his artistic influence. In 1897, with the encouragement of Whall, Lowndes established her own studio-workshop with Alfred J. Drury. Drury was the foreman at the Britten and Gilson workshop, and co-instructor of stained glass with Whall at the

Central School of Arts and Crafts The Central School of Art and Design was a public art school, school of fine arts, fine and applied arts in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1896 by the London County Council as the Central ...

. The new studio-workshop in Chelsea was named Lowndes and Drury. The venture developed out of Lowndes and Drury's shared experience of working for a big studio, and they created their new enterprise to meet the needs of the new school of independent artists associated with the emerging Arts and Crafts movement. The studio-workshop would provide the technical facilities to allow artists to work on all stages of their stained glass commissions, from design to glass selection, painting and glazing. Mary Lowndes Holy Innocents 1896

The partnership was established with an initial investment of £30 from each partner. Lowndes also provided a £200 loan and additional loans of £280 came from Lowndes's companion, Barbara Forbes, her aunt, Miss Alice Vivian Kaye and friend, Miss J.F. Pearson. Along with Drury's small investment, the new firm was financed in its early years by these four women. Lowndes managed the new business with Drury, but chose not to be chief designer of the workshop. Like other workshop clients, she primarily used the facilities to work on her own stained glass commissions. Her stained glass was highly regarded and in great demand at the time, and her work can be seen in parish churches throughout England and Wales. In 1906, with the need for bigger facilities, Lowndes and Drury founded the Glass House in Lettice Street,

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandswor ...

. The building at 9, 10, 11 and 12 Lettice Street was established as a stained glass studio for works commissioned by Lowndes and Drury and for use by independent artists. It was a purpose-built stained glass studio and workshop, designed by Christopher Whall and Drury. The Glass House attracted many artists, including

Wilhelmina Geddes Wilhelmina Geddes ''HRUA'' (25 May 1887 – 10 August 1955) was an Irish stained glass artist who was an important figure within the Irish Arts and Crafts movement and also the twentieth century British stained glass revival. Notable works includ ...

and Robert Anning Bell. In the early twentieth century, it was considered the most important studio-workshop for stained glass associated with the Arts and Crafts movement.''The Glass House, Hammersmith and Fulham.''
British Listed Buildings. Retrieved 10 September 2012.

Suffragette movement

Lowndes became involved in the

Women's suffrage movement Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vot ...

in the 1890s. In 1899, she attended the

International Congress of Women The International Congress of Women was created so that groups of existing women's suffrage movements could come together with other women's groups around the world. It served as a way for women organizations across the nation to establish formal m ...

in London. In January 1907, Lowndes established The

(ASL) to create dramatic posters, postcards, Christmas cards, and banners for

suffrage Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...

events. She became its chair and Barbara Forbes, her companion, was the secretary.

Lisa Tickner Lisa Tickner FBA is a British art historian. She has taught at Middlesex University (where she is now Emeritus Professor), Northwestern University, and the Courtauld Institute of Art (where she is now Honorary Professor). In 2008 she was elected ...

"Banners and Banner-Making". In Vanessa R. Schwartz and Jeannene M. Przyblyski, "The Nineteenth Century Visual Culture Reader". Routledge, 2004, London and New York. Elizabeth fry

Between 1903 and 1914, the methods used by the women's suffrage movement began to change and they began to engage in public demonstrations and other propaganda activities. Lowndes' training as an artist and stained-glass designer encouraged the use of bold shapes and a love of full, rich colours, using striking combinations of green and blue, magenta and orange. She wrote a guide in 1910 to help women create their own ''Banners and Banner-Making'', saying of the suffrage banners: "you do not want to read it, you want to worship it. Choose purple and gold for ambition, red for courage, green for long-cherished hopes ... It is a declaration." Such banners were designed with female images like flowers, lit lamps, shells, sunrays, winged hearts; and to honour female heroines like Boadicea, Elizabeth Fry, Florence Nightingale, Marie Curie, Josephine Butler, Jane Austen, Mary Wollstonecraft, Charlotte Brontë and even 'Victoria, Queen and Mother'. These were carried in their hundreds or thousands in London's Pageant of Great Women 1909, Hyde Park Rally 1910, From Prison to Citizenship 1911, Pilgrimage for Women's Suffrage 1913, and later that year at the grand funeral procession of Emily Wilding Davison, the suffrage movement's martyr who threw herself under the King's horse at the Epsom Derby. An album of Lowndes' original banner designs (detailed on paper in watercolour and often accompanied by fabric swatches) resides at the

Women's Library The Women's Library is England's main library and museum resource on women and the women's movement, concentrating on Britain in the 19th and 20th centuries. It has an institutional history as a coherent collection dating back to the mid-1920s, ...

at the London School of Economics. Lowndes was also personally active in the national Suffragette movement, including her leadership of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies executive committee.Lago, Mary. (1995). ''Christiana Herringham and the Edwardian Art Scene.'' University of Missouri Press. p. 287 She was a member of the committee of the feminist magazine ''

The Englishwoman's Review ''The Englishwoman's Review'' was a feminist periodical published in England between 1866 and 1910. Until 1869 called in full ''The Englishwoman's Review: a journal of woman's work'', in 1870 (after a break in publication) it was renamed ''The E ...

'' and contributed regularly to it.

Personal life

Lowndes' lifelong companion was Barbara Forbes, the secretary of the Artists' Suffrage League founded by Lowndes. Throughout her life, Lowndes suffered from chronic asthma. Lowndes died in 1929 and was buried in Buxted, East Sussex, England. She left Forbes a sum of money, all her pictures, prints, cartoons, studio effects and her shares in The Englishwoman Ltd.

Selected stained glass work

Posthumous recognition

Lowndes's name and picture (and those of 58 other women's suffrage supporters) are on the

plinth A pedestal (from French ''piédestal'', Italian ''piedistallo'' 'foot of a stall') or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In ...

of the statue of Millicent Fawcett in Parliament Square, London, unveiled in 2018.

Gallery

File:MLowndes Feed my sheep.jpg, Lowndes's first stained glass window, Hinton St Mary, Dorset (1893) File:The church of SS Peter and Paul in Shropham - glass by M Lowndes - geograph.org.uk - 1761436.jpg, Sts Peter and Paul, Shropham, Norfolk (1898) File:Sts_Peter_and_Paul,_West_Mersea,_Mersea_Island,_Essex.jpg, Sts Peter and Paul,

Mersea Island Mersea Island is an island in Essex, England, in the Blackwater and Colne estuaries to the south-east of Colchester. Its name comes from the Old English word ''meresig'', meaning "island of the pool" and thus is tautological. The island is ...

, Essex (1905) File:M Lowndes St Erme Cornwall 1906.jpg, St Erme, Cornwall (1906) File:Stained glass Aesthetic.jpg,

Taplow Taplow is a village and civil parish in the Unitary Authority of Buckinghamshire, England. It sits on the left bank of the River Thames, facing Maidenhead in the neighbouring county of Berkshire, with Cippenham and Burnham to the east. It is the ...

, Buckinghamshire, (1912)