Web(b)

One of the great joys of stained glass window hunting is the finding of a maker's mark. Its like a 'Where's Wally?' illustration on an enormous scale but, in most cases, Wally isn't even in the picture. The vast majority of stained glass is unsigned and unmarked. Anonymous reigns supreme. But, every so often you come up with a gem, usually in the bottom left or right hand corner and usually very small. This one is in a window depicting St Michael slaying a dragon (not to be mistaken for St George in the same pose). The window is about two metres high and half a metre wide and the maker's mark is just two centimetres high. Maker's marks often come in the form of a visual pun or rebus. This is the first time I've found this one. It is a spider's web, the mark of the designer Geoffrey Webb. I pointed it out to the church warden who happened to be present when I visited. She had been attending the church for sixty years and had never noticed it before.