Stained Glass Southend-On-Sea

Founded in 1994, the Leadbitter Glass Studio has been supplying Overlay Stained Glass panels to homes and businesses across Southend-on-Sea ever since, delivering to every other part of the UK too. St John the Baptist Church, overlooking the estuary near the pier, holds a “Pelican in her Piety” stained glass window by the celebrated Victorian studio Clayton & Bell.

Every panel is designed and manufactured in our own Decorative Glass Studio — either from your own photo or idea, or from one of the hundreds of patterns in our gallery. Our Overlay Stained Glass comes as either toughened single glazing or a resilient double-glazed unit, and suits a front door, a landing window, or any other glazed opening in the home equally well. The great majority of orders qualify for free delivery across Southend-on-Sea.

We’ve supplied Overlay Stained Glass for a Prime Minister’s home, for Hollywood film sets, and for well-known musicians and billionaires — though the vast majority of what we make is still for homeowners across Southend-on-Sea. We also produce other styles of Decorative Glass for Southend-on-Sea clients, including Bevelled Glass, Etched Glass, and Fused Glass.

See your glass before we create it!

Our Free Client Pages Design Service

Every order comes with free access to our Client Pages design service. A few days after you order, we’ll send a computer-generated proof built to your exact glass sizes and colourway, so you can see precisely how the finished panel will look. Ask for a different border, an adjusted shade, or a resized motif — we’ll keep refining the drawing until you’re happy, and production only begins once you’ve signed it off.

Image above created using Minster Glass.

How Our Stained Glass Is Made

Our technique holds a real advantage over traditional stained glass when it comes to keeping a home warm. The entire design is built by hand and coloured directly onto toughened safety glass, so there’s no fragile old-style leadwork left to weaken with age.

Pilkington K Glass is also available on request, and is now required by building regulations for new window and door installations across Southend-on-Sea and the rest of the UK.

We take durability and security as seriously as design, which is why every panel is manufactured with toughened or laminated safety glass from the outset.

It wasn’t unusual, in the past, for homeowners to spend thousands of pounds on traditional leaded glass, only to see individual coloured pieces cracking within weeks of installation. That simply isn’t something you’ll experience with Overlay Stained Glass.

Our process

We begin by hand-shaping lead strips onto a solid sheet of toughened glass, tracing out an uncoloured outline of your chosen design. The glass is then turned over, and the colourwork begins — each piece of stained glass overlay colour is individually cut and set between the leaded lines.

Once the coloured side is complete, matching lead strips are applied to the reverse, mirroring the design exactly. What emerges is a panel that’s fully leaded and fully coloured on both faces, built entirely by hand.

A range of different lead finishes is available too — see our Leaded Glass section for more.

Ready to have Overlay Stained Glass, or any other decorative glass, made for your Southend-on-Sea home or business? Get in touch today for an accurate quote and turnaround time.

Browse Our Leaded Glass Galleries

Our website holds one of the largest collections of decorative glass patterns anywhere. Browse hundreds of Leaded Glass designs in our main gallery, arranged by theme and by door style, to find the right pattern — or simply for inspiration towards your own. Visit the Main Gallery to see what’s possible.

Notable Stained Glass Commissions from the Southend area…