In Volume II of her biography of her father, and her account of his work on Westminster Cathedral, Winfried d'Hôpital explains that his meeting with Nathaniel Westlake in 1859 resulted in "a connection and a friendship enduring for nearly a quarter of a century between the architect and the afterwards well-known stained glass designer and writer on ecclesiastical decoration, etc." She also explains that "Bentley made the designs for stained glass which Westlake cartooned and executed. It was through Bentley too that Nat Westlake met Lavers, the glass painter, and went to work for his firm" (353-54). Later, she gives the following, more detailed, account of her father's stained glass commissions, including those early ones on which he collaborated with Westlake. — Jacqueline Banerjee
entley's forty years' practice in the art of stained glass design divides itself almost equally into two very distinctly differentiated periods. During the first his work in this craft was executed in a collaboration, more or less close, with Mr. N. H. J. Westlake and the firm of glass painters of which he is a member. In the second (that is, after 1883 or thereabouts) Bentley adopted other measures to ensure that the rendering of his designs should be as expressive as might be possible of his own ideals of the perfection of the glass painter's art. To this end, the cartoonist, the glass cutter and the painter were persons without any tie of [522/23] commercial interest, working directly for him and possibly indeed unknown to each other. Thereby Bentley was able to exercise a very autocratic control over the various processes and to train those who worked for him in a way that would have been impossible had they been in the employ of some firm, and therefore not individually responsible to himself.
For a brief space subsequently to 1883, we believe that the late Mr. John Stacey drew some cartoons for him, Savelle and Young being employed as glass painters. In 1887 Bentley discovered a first-rate cartoonist in the person of Mr. George Daniels, who thenceforward produced most if not all of his cartoons for stained glass, opus sectile, and decorative painting; he likewise had the good fortune to find, about the same period, a glass painter of exceptional ability, the late Mr. John Sears. Mr. George Daniels prepared the cartoons from Bentley's designs, which at first were small coloured drawings, and finally, we believe, became merely the roughest of pencil sketches, with marginal notes of colour and ornament, quite intelligible to and sufficient for one so familiar with the architect's methods. Bentley would correct or alter the preliminary sketches, and finally choose the glass with infinite care, exercising the closest supervision over the processes of painting and staining.
The writer, on one occasion questioning Mr. N. H. J. Westlake to discover how it came about that the early stained glass he and Bentley produced in collaboration was based with such whole-souled fidelity on primitive models, drew from him the following characteristic expression of opinion, in which is conveyed the truth that fashions change and with them even so individual an architect as Bentley:
Your question about our work at Streatham involves a lot of answer to account for the very "mosaic-y" look of it. Your father was with [Henry] Clutton for a long time, and was ingrained with early ideas when first I met him. I, on the contrary, was "nuts" on the Italian quattro centi as painters — see the first work we did together, St. John and our Lady's Communion at St. Francis's. [523/24] Your father put in the diapered background to give it an earlier taste. The little history of change may be thus. I met the late Theodore Phyffers at Burges's rooms one afternoon about 1860 or so, and in course of conversation a clever young person at Clutton's was mentioned — entre nous, Burges did not like your father and sniffed. Phyffers said, "I will ask him to meet you at my house." This was done. Phyffers was doing the group of St. Augustine for St. Augustine's College, Canterbury, from Burges's sketch. Phyffers had been brought by Pugin from Antwerp to do figures for the Houses of Parliament, and even his style was a little too early for your father, who got him, however, to do some of his earlier work: see the altar frontal at St. Mary's, Chelsea. You will see how he was fascinated by the early "rage."* After practising some years, he seemed to me to leave Cluttonism and early French for Bodleyism, which at one time he greatly admired, and he fell into a species of decorated work — e.g. Kensal — St. Mary's, Chelsea — Hammersmith, etc., etc., and glass likewise. . . . Then little by little his affection for the fifteenth century grew, as it was growing all around us. For we see fashion in art has supplanted a consistent and well-developed style."
In another letter Mr. Westlake wrote: "You are on very delicate ground in '64 and on, for at that time work and art were very bad, and your father nothing much more than a student of glass.... We were young." Anyway, that they were both on true and right lines as glass designer and painter is borne out by an unintentionally naive little admission in a parish magazine (Christ Church, Streatham) published in 1864. Eight stained glass windows, painted by Messrs. O'Connor, had just been placed in the aisles of this church by a family belonging to the congregation, while the south gallery had received four windows from another member, Mr. John Montefiore, which were carried out by Bentley and Westlake. The vicar's appreciation is worded as follows (the italics are ours):
Both series of windows are splendid specimens [524/25] of the art, though in different styles: — those of the Messrs. O'Connor being more elaborately finished as pictures, while Mr. Bentley's and Mr. Westlake's are more severe and transparent, transmitting little, if any, less light than the common glass windows which they have replaced,"
In most of their early commissions the work was allocated thus: the sketches were Bentley's, the figure cartoons were prepared by Westlake, and Bentley again was responsible for the full-size drawings of the ornament. In a few of the examples quoted later the commission was given to Westlake himself, who invited Bentley's collaboration; though in the majority, the reverse was the case. Together they exhibited a stained glass window at the Paris Exhibition of 1867; it gained a silver medal, ultimately fated to be stolen from Mr. Westlake by burglars.
The end of their long collaboration came in the early 'eighties (we believe about 1883), when a serious professional disagreement resulted in the death of friendship and the unhappy termination of all communication between the two men.
*Bentley's friend Willement's production of thirteenth-century glass at that time must doubtless be counted a factor in the former's predilection.
Bibliograpy
de l'Hôpital, Winefride. Westminster Cathedral and Its Architect: Volume II, The Making of the Architect. 2 vols. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1919. Internet Archive. Contributed by University of California Libraries. Web. 23 August 2020.
Created 23 August 2020