leading a side lite

 Leading, that crucial first step in joining the individual glass pieces together. Here I am leading a simple leaded glass side lite, which is part of a bigger leaded glass entryway. 

After the glass has been cut, grossed and filed to the size of my paper patterns, I lay it all out according to where each piece goes in the final panel. The circles are clear hand blown rondels and do not need to be cut. Surrounding the circles is clear, heavy seedy glass. All the glass is handblown. 

This is a poor photo of the lead came profile. There are two techniques used in stained glass, the copper foil technique and the lead came technique. I use lead came in all my work for various reasons, mainly because that is what I was taught.  Many people who take a stained glass course learn the copper foil technique. Looking at the profile of the lead came you can see a grove on each side.

These grooves or slots is where the glass fits into. Again a poor photo but you should get the idea of how the glass fits snugly into the groves.

Starting at one end of the leaded glass side lite,

I secure the first piece of glass against the outer edge lead. The edge lead is what surrounds the whole leaded glass panel. It gets buried into the wood frame of the door or side lite and therefore is not visible after I install the glass panel.

Next I place a strip of came lead against one of the edges of the glass. I line up the next glass piece against the other side of the lead came and ...

measure and cut the lead came to the proper length.

The third piece is the rondel shown here already wrapped in lead came. Again it is secured against the two other pieces of glass.

Guess what comes next, right, the fourth piece.

I could go on like this for all 30+ pieces but I think you get the idea.

Finally the glass panel is assembled and ready for soldering.