RHEIMS CATHEDRAL.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 48, Issue 80, 14 January 1928, Page 7

RHEIMS CATHEDRAL.

NEW GLASS WINDOWS. The work of restoring stained glass windows in the famous Cathedral of Rheims has been delegated to the family of Jacques Simon 6ince the fifteenth century. Simon is completing the restoration of the nineteenth of the splendid thirteenth century windows of the cathedral destroyed during the war. Designs of the windows made by his father in 1880 are used as a basis of replacements when storms broke sections of the precious glass. Bits of broken glaes are the modern artist's chief guide to duplication of colours for the windows. Although his father's designs are in colour Simon has studied fragments of the original glass wherever, possible in an effort to copy, as closely as modern methods can, the rich colouring of the ancient work. Simon works in a studio especially equipped for the Rheims Cathedral task. Restoration of the windows is his life work. Of the 39 windows in the church only six were spared by war devastation. The slight restoration of these six was early accomplished. The other 11 which he has dons had to be done in whole or part. The remaining work is the most serious and complicated.