Sharon Lorenzo takes us from Tiffany to the new windows at Notre Dame Cathedral.
Clara Wolcott, 1861-1944
Claire Tabouret,1982
After a yearlong competition with 100 applicants, the French cultural minister announced that his committee had chosen a young woman who was born in France and had submitted for the redesign of the missing windows in the Notre Dame Cathedral the most impressive sketches interpreting the Biblical idea of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit of God blessed the apostles and guests 50 days after Easter. Claire said that her years of training at the Ecolé des Beaux Arts in Paris and the Cooper Union student program in New York have prepared her for this very honorable and historic commission.
Claire Tabouret and design sketches, 2025.
Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933)
As a 19th century predicate for this commission is the story of how glass design evolved in the United States. Charles Tiffany took some of the proceeds from his very successful jewelry business and allowed his son, Louis Comfort Tiffany, to start a new venture making works from glass shards in both New York City and Queens. He was able to hire women who were looking for jobs even before they received the right to vote in 1920. One of these was a young woman from Ohio who had lost her father at age 12 and by 18 was looking for a creative way to help support her family. Clara Wolcott came to live with other girls in a New York city boarding house and started at the Tiffany studios. She showed some of her sketches to Louis, and he loved the floral designs and allowed her to begin working first on lamps with kerosene, then after electricity was invented in 1882, on more lamps with chords. Her letters to her mother and sisters were discovered in 1955, and these allowed the world to follow the evolution of the glass business. In 1904 Clara told her family that she was making $10,000 per year. In 1906 one of her lamp designs sold for $500.00 which was the same price as an early Ford motor car!
Clara’s Workshop, 1905, NYC.
Assembled lamps.
In 2007, the New York Historical Society received a major gift from collector Dr. Egon Neustadt of 132 Tiffany lamps. The director and staff immediately designed a two -story installation for them on the third and fourth floor of the Museum. The examples capture the many ideas of flowers of all varieties which the ladies assembled in the factories with the help of male welders.
NY Historical Society gallery, 2007.
Floral Design of Clara Wolcott.
A magnificent catalog has been assembled of the entire collection in New York with examples of many lamps. Photos also capture some of the larger glass mural commissions in St. John the Divine Church in New York, the Metropolitan Museum American wing and Princeton University to name but a few locations. A very innovative spot in the museum allows the lucky visitor to model on a video table a creation of his/her glass design.
Virtual Glass design Table.
The legacy of the ladies at the Tiffany studios is a model for Claire Tabouret and an inspiration for her new windows at Notre Dame. We will await with eagerness the completion of her work as a living example of the legacy of women in the field of glass design.
New York Historical Society, NYC.
Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, France.
Tiffany Lamp Display – New York Historical Society Photo by Corrado Serra
Sources consulted:
- A New Light on Tiffany. The New York Historical Society, 2007.
- Out of Flames, New Works Arise. Matt Stevens, The New York Times, February 2, 2025.
