Picking a Stained Glass Committee
* Choose people who will show up consistently for the many meetings involved.

* Choose people with wide variety of experiences that represent the wider church community at large. This will ensure that the choices of all the church members will be considered.

* Many churches try to include people on a stained glass committee with a background in fine arts, relying on their knowledge and familiarity with visual media.

* Keep the number as small as you can be comfortable with. Twelve is good. Seven is better.

* Choose members that are vocal and are comfortable expressing opinions and debating the merits of their positions. I often find myself drawing opinions out of a silent room full of committee members.

Picking a Stained Glass Artist
This process should absolutely include a face-to-face meeting with the designer. It is essential that the committee have direct access to the creative interpreter of their ideas. It is also essential that the artist and the committee be a good fit in terms of personalities. Hard choices need to be made, and through long meetings, the committee must have the cooperation of someone with whom they feel comfortable working.
Many committees put a great deal of effort into fashioning an elaborate prospectus, outlining in great detail what they imagine to be the right solution for each setting. They will then forward this rubric to several studios, requiring a response of artwork before ever meeting the designers. In doing this, they disallow the experience a creative mind can bring to their earliest deliberations. The better method is to search for artists whose past work they admire and whom they view as possible candidates. Choosing a select small group of candidates, they should then invite each artist to meet with them individually. Such interviews are very telling.

Issues to Consider When Interviewing Stained Glass Candidates
* Who among the candidates is the most receptive to their concepts?

* Who is enthusiastic about their project?

* Whose experience will help them and their architect through the important phase of window framing and engineering (to be discussed later)?

* In this vein, costs are an important issue and should be discussed up front and early. It is part of the artist's responsibility to help the church stay within their budget. Difficult budgetary constraints often foster creative visual solutions.

Framing
Often the church's window designs are cast in stone before the committee ever realizes what has happened. I cannot tell you how many times I have come into a project only to find that the committee's desired subject matter cannot be accommodated because the window frames have been formatted in a configuration that will simply not allow their choices to be realized.

It is of the utmost importance that the artist be chosen long before the window frames are engineered. The reasons for this are simple and understandable. Consider this example. The committee envisions a large glorious figure of Christ centrally located in a window above the altar. Imagine their disappointment when they find that such a composition is rendered impossible because their architect has ordered a window frame with a structural bar running down the center of the window. They have discovered this at a point when design revisions are now impossible with contracts let and materials ordered. Revisions at this point will bust the budget and cause delays in the construction schedule. Frustrating dilemmas such as this one can be avoided by choosing an artist early in the process while the church is still being designed.

Architects focus on countless decisions throughout the process and may be unaware of the congregation's plans for subject matter in their windows. By bringing the artist on board early, they can rely on his/her experience with these issues. An experienced artist will advocate for their visions for stained glass and negotiate with the architect and the window frame manufacturer to ensure that the committee's visions can be realized comfortably.

State-of-the-art windows in the 21st century provide thermal efficiency, but stained glass adds an extra layer of engineering that must be designed in initially. Church window frames engineered to hold stained glass are readily available from a variety of manufacturers. Such frames include efficient state-of-the-art thermal break features and channels engineered to hold the sections of stained glass on the interior. The best feature of these frames is their slim sight lines that provide structural support with the least interruption to the composition.
One of the pitfalls to avoid in choosing a window frame system is the use of normal storefront aluminum frames and then retrofitting them to hold stained glass. This process is costly in labor and visually unsatisfactory because these types of frames often have thick mullions, which can interrupt the flow of figures or disrupt a design composition.

Costs
The finest hand-blown European glasses are amazing works of art in themselves delivered to distributors via container ships. These unique and vibrant raw colors cost between $10 and $20 a square foot. The brilliance and beauty of this select palette are the hallmark of the best artists in this medium. Lesser-quality machine rolled glasses lack the subtle variations that hand-blown glasses possess.

Contemporary stained glass normally costs in a range of $200 to $400 per square foot. Comparing the numbers, one can easily see that it is the labor intensity of this medium, not the fineness of the materials that adds the value in this fine art. It is important to note that it is not the amount of area to be filled that dictates the cost. Rather, it is the intensity of the labor required to execute a given design that determines the final figure. Many pieces of glass or more difficult cuts of glass will result in a more costly design. Above and beyond cutting and glazing, designs that require painting add another layer of intense labor.  Generally speaking, a large window will be more costly to fill than a small window; however, a small window with an intensely intricate design featuring painted figures can easily cost more than a larger simpler composition.

Hard decisions face any committee that is building a new church. Often it is the budget for fine arts that suffers when cost overruns begin to threaten a project. It is our suggestion that the stained glass committee should formulate a realistic budget and stick to it. We have already mentioned how constraints can often elicit creative responses. This is perhaps the hardest challenge that will face any committee. It must be recognized that the meaning and value of sacred art to any community must ultimately go beyond the simple matter of dollars and cents. Likewise, it is the greatest challenge for the artist who must rise to the occasion and offer his or her talents and give his or her best efforts regardless of the budget.

Fundraising
I have mentioned that it is important to have diverse talents on any committee accepting this challenge. One more talent that should be on any team is a good fundraiser. The stained glass committee that has a professional fundraiser on board is truly blessed. It is part of the job that the committee is ready and willing to invite the congregation to contribute directly to the budget for fine arts. The committee must be ready and willing to sell the concept and advocate for the inclusion of fine arts in the finished product. It simply comes down to asking people for money, emphasizing the importance and stressing the need for works of art that express and realize the community's faith in a tactful, recognizable medium.

Many building committees will set aside a portion of the overall building budget for fine arts. This is a fine approach but one that often results in disappointment.

The dream of a new church project meets reality when the architect invites bids for all the work from local contractors. It is often cost overruns that cut into the budget for what seems like luxury items such as stained glass. Throughout many efforts to raise funds, a community will be drawn upon continually to create the basis of funding for a grand scheme.

Consider adopting a fine arts fundraising effort that runs parallel to the quest for general project fundraising. Often those who can be relied upon to support the building project can be called upon for a deeper commitment to fine arts. The allure of fine arts can often draw a positive response from those very people who have already contributed mightily to the general fund.  There can be no greater fundraising tool than the presence of beautiful in-scale renderings of the proposed windows.  A temporary display of the designs during services will invite the congregation to imagine worshipping in the presence of beautiful works of art.

When I go into older churches, I am always drawn to appreciate the history displayed in their windows. Family members, parents and grandparents are often memorialized in touching gestures notated in handsome inscriptions. In the recent past, this tradition has been eschewed in favor of plaques and recognitions in church bulletins. I hereby submit that there can be no greater expression of legacy for continuing generations to honor and appreciate than written memorials designed into the windows. I have personally seen congregations who have embraced this tradition raise considerable sums by permitting named memorial inscriptions to be included in the window designs. Whether or not memorial inscriptions are included, separating the fine arts budget from the general building fund raising scheme will protect and ensure that the stained glass will survive in spite of cost overruns in the general project.

Liturgical Designer
Here I would urge any committee to consider the services of a liturgical designer.  A designer will bring to bear the experience of past projects that no one on the committee will possess until the project is finished. They will negotiate with other professionals and contractors to insure that your goals are achieved. It is not the designer’s role to impose their taste but rather to expose the committee to options that otherwise would go unexplored. Most of you reading this article will rely on an accountant to prepare your taxes knowing that their knowledge and experience will pay for itself. Similarly, the knowledge and experience of a liturgical designer offers the reward of a finished product that will continue to please the congregation for many generations as a coordinated and inspiring worship environment.  Their role is to help the committee see the “big picture” concerning art and furnishings.  Do not assume that you cannot afford the services of a liturgical designer. Their services are valuable, whether the budget is lean or rich.

Joseph and Rita Beyer are the owners of Beyer Studio, www.beyerstudio.com.