Stained Glass in the USA: Places to See

Stained glass was being made in Britain long before the United States existed. Glaziers are recorded at the monastery of Monkwearmouth and Jarrow in the seventh century, and by the time the first American windows were made the great medieval cathedrals of England were already centuries old. American glass is a younger story, but a lively one, and it owes a good deal to Britain: the Arts and Crafts windows of William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones were admired and imported, and they shaped the work of the Americans who followed.

This page is a guide to some of the best places to see stained glass in the United States, from Prairie houses to museum domes. It is a companion to the stained glass tour of the UK, which covers the best glass in Britain.

Map of stained glass in the USA

Places to see

Map	Place	What to see
1	Arizona Biltmore, Phoenix, Arizona	Frank Lloyd Wright’s saguaro cactus window in the hotel lobby, made in 1973 from a design of 1926.
2	Robie House, Chicago, Illinois	Wright’s Prairie masterpiece, with long runs of leaded glass doors and windows in diamond patterns.
2	Unity Temple, Oak Park, Illinois	Wright’s concrete church of 1908, lit by art glass windows and skylights.
2	Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, Illinois	Preston Bradley Hall is topped by a Tiffany glass dome of 1897, claimed as the largest of its kind in the world.
2	Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois	Marc Chagall’s America Windows, made in 1977 and given to the city for the American bicentennial.
3	Dana-Thomas House, Springfield, Illinois	Wright’s house of 1902 to 1904, with the largest surviving collection of his art glass in a single building.
4	Darwin D. Martin House, Buffalo, New York	The home of the Tree of Life windows, one of Wright’s best-known glass designs.
5	Corning Museum of Glass, Corning, New York	One of the world’s leading glass museums, with stained glass among its collections.
6	Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York	The American Wing shows Tiffany glass from his Laurelton Hall home and Wright windows.
7	Trinity Church, Boston, Massachusetts	H. H. Richardson’s church of 1877, glazed by the American John La Farge and by the British firm Morris and Co. to designs by Edward Burne-Jones.
8	Washington National Cathedral, Washington DC	Over two hundred windows, including the Space Window of 1974 that holds a piece of lunar rock.
9	Morse Museum, Winter Park, Florida	The largest collection of Tiffany work, including the chapel he made for the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair.

Wright, Tiffany and the American style

Two names dominate American glass of the early twentieth century. Frank Lloyd Wright designed abstract, mostly clear leaded windows for his Prairie houses, while Louis Comfort Tiffany developed opalescent glass and used it to make windows, lamps and domes of great richness. Older traditions run alongside them: the windows of Trinity Church in Boston show American and British makers working side by side.

Related pages

• Stained glass tour of the UK
• Frank Lloyd Wright
• Louis Comfort Tiffany
• Studying Glass in the USA
• The History of Stained Glass in the USA

Sources and further reading

• The Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Art Institute of Chicago
• Corning Museum of Glass
• Washington National Cathedral