A reputation for staining

I've more than a vested interest in making stained glass. Not only have I had a lifelong fascination with rose windows and all things Victorian, but I've also got some ugly panes in my flat, and fancy myself as a kind of downmarket Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen. So I enter Rainbow Glass Studios with visions of Pre-Raphaelite splendour, considering whether I should choose a Rossetti or Burne-Jones painting as my model. And then owner Richard tells me we'll be lucky to finish a nine-pieced, A4-sized pane in the next seven hours.

This is not a job for people who have a) a lack of patience, b) a problem with precision c) a blinding hangover. I have all three, and my handy knack at both breaking the glass in the wrong place and not pressing hard enough on the compass-like cutter to make an indentation is, I hope, entertaining at least. But I end up drawing a design that's about as hard as nine sections could possibly be, as it's completely curved.

Fortunately, Richard helps me out, using special 'grozing' pliers and a grinder to make the glass fit my paper pattern exactly (essential if your work is to fill a specified space). The next step is to cut strips of hollow leading to make a frame, and thus assemble the piece. Working with such tiny sections might be fiddlier than sewing a doll's underpants, but you can't beat it for job satisfaction. My medieval flower finally looks like a bona-fide stained-glass panel. But each join needs soldering in place to keep blossoming. So, after going over the lead with a steel brush and a lump of tallow to make the solder stick (being a vegetarian, I leave the tallow part to Richard), I'm given a soldering iron as hot as the Caribbean sun in one hand and a strip of solder in the other. It's now 6pm, so we skip the final stage of weatherproofing and I head home. Somehow, when I hold the finished panel (below) over my door, I find those Pre-Raphaelite visions have returned...

Stained-glass making, Rainbow Glass Studios, 172C Stoke Newington Church Street, N16. For details, call Richard Paton on 020-7249 0276 or e-mail enquiries@rainbowglassstudios.co.uk