J&R Lamb Studios

J&R Lamb Studios, America's oldest continuously-run decorative arts company, is famous as a stained glass maker, preceding the studios of both John LaFarge and Louis C. Tiffany.[2]

Frederick Stymetz Lamb. Religion Enthroned, Brooklyn Museum. Gift of Irving T. Bush in memory of his father and mother, 29.1082. Creative Commons-BY-NC.[1]

History

The J&R Lamb Studios was established in 1857 by brothers Joseph (1833–1898) and Richard Lamb (1836–1909) in Greenwich Village in New York City. Their parents, Joseph Lamb (1806-1840) and Elizabeth Clark (1809-1838) were married on October 1, 1832, in Orpington, Kent, England. Elizabeth Clark Lamb died on April 7, 1838, during a difficult childbirth in which the infant was stillborn. They left Lewisham, England, at some point in 1840 to come to the United States with their father, a landscape architect, who had been engaged to work on Niblo's Garden, an exhibition hall and open-air theater.[2][3] During the voyage, their father died, and a sympathetic Scottish couple, Peter Rennie (1805-1870) and Agnes Rennie (1809-1894), who were also making the journey to America, took on the responsibility of caring for these two young boys and became their foster parents. The boys grew up in the Rennie home at Dobbs Ferry, New York. As a young man in the early 1850s, Joseph was active in literary and poetic circles in New York City and was a member of the Irving Literary Union, founded in New York City in 1852 in honor of the great author, Washington Irving (1783-1859). Joseph was enthusiastic about the Gothic Revival movement. That enthusiasm may have come about as the result of exposure to the efforts and literature of the New York Ecclesiological Society. For a time, Joseph Lamb considered entering the ministry or becoming a church musician. However, as his talent lay elsewhere, he decided it was better "to make the art of the church his life's work."[4]

Originally, the company also did mosaic, murals, monuments, and other work for churches, temples, residences, government and academic institutions.

The firm was chosen by the United States government as one of four studios to represent American achievements in stained glass at the Paris International Exposition of 1900. They won two prizes for their window entitled Religion Enthroned designed by Frederick Stymetz Lamb (1862–1928), the third of Joseph's sons.[1][3] Frederick's brother, Charles Rollinson Lamb (1860-1942), a renowned City Beautiful theorist and architect, shaped the studio's aesthetic and intellectual character and business.[2] Frederick became its head of design and supervised the firm's team of skilled craftsman.[5] In the early 1920s Frederick and his wife Nellie moved to Berkeley, California where he supervised local civic projects and frequently exhibited his landscapes in oil to great acclaim at the art colonies in Berkeley and Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.[6]

Ella Condie Lamb, the wife of Charles Rollinson Lamb, was a well known artist and stained glass designer, also winning a medal in the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 for her oil work, "The Advent Angel".[7][8]

Studio owner and family member, Karl Barre Lamb (1890–1969), was president of the Stained Glass Association of America 1954–1955 and an elected fellow.[9] Lamb descendants ran the studios until his death.[2] Under Karl B. Lamb's leadership, the studios relocated to Tenafly, New Jersey after the Great Depression.[3]

In 1970, Lamb Studios artist Donald Samick bought the firm.[2]

With the death of the stained glass artist Katharine Lamb Tait (1895–1981), the daughter of Charles Rollinson Lamb, the Lamb family was no longer involved with the studio.[10]

The Library of Congress is the repository for the Lamb Studios Archive.[2][11]

Studio location history

Cf. Lamb Studios Archive: Background, Library of Congress

Selected works

Glass
Design drawing c.1927 by Katharine Lamb Tait, J&R Lamb Studios, for a stained glass window called Arts Education, Froelich Memorial Window in the Newark Museum

Stone

References
  1. "Religion Enthroned", Brooklyn Museum collection description. (alternative view at Britannica)
  2. Lamb Studios Archive - Library of Congress
  3. Seeley, Barea Lamb, "Lamb Studios History", Encyclopedia of New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 2004. Cf. pp. 452-453
  4. . ISBN 978-0-9982889-0-1. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  5. "Frederick Stymetz Lamb", Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery
  6. Edwards, Robert W. (2012). Jennie V. Cannon: The Untold History of the Carmel and Berkeley Art Colonies, Vol. 1. Oakland, Calif.: East Bay Heritage Project. pp. 265, 478–479, 689. ISBN 9781467545679. An online facsimile of the entire text of Vol. 1 is posted on the Traditional Fine Arts Organization website ("Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-04-29. Retrieved 2016-06-07.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link))
  7. "Lamb, Ella Condie (1862–1936): STAINED GLASS ARTIST; MURALIST", Philadelphia Architects and Buildings, The Athenaeum of Philadelphia.
  8. Wood, Wallace, "The Advent Angel, by Ella Condie Lamb", The Century Magazine, Volume 47 Issue 2 (December 1893)
  9. "Past Presidents of the Stained Glass Association of America", Stained Glass Association of America.
  10. "Obituary: Katharine Lamb Tait, Designed Stained Glass", The New York Times, August 13, 1981
  11. Lamb Studio Archive photo collection – Library of Congress
  12. "Camp Lejeune Window". Archived from the original on 2011-03-14. Retrieved 2009-10-07.
  13. "Dedication of the Roswell P. Flower Memorial Library" Archived 2012-03-01 at the Wayback Machine, Watertown, New York, 1903.
  14. "Design drawing for stained glass window called Arts Education, Froelich Memorial Window" - Lamb Studios Archive, Library of Congress
  15. "Building of the Day: 75 Hicks Street" Archived 2010-12-26 at the Wayback Machine, Brownstoner, December 2010
  16. "South Clerestory Windows - St. Paul Episcopal Cathedral", Buffalo Architecture and History
  17. "History of the Chapel" Archived 2011-08-31 at the Wayback Machine, Tuskegee University.

Further reading
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