Monkseaton Metro station stained glass artwork restored in £400,000 refurbishment

Monkseaton Metro station is currently undergoing a makeover, with experts at Sunderland’s National Glass Centre restoring the 40-year-old ‘Beaches and Shipyards’ stained glass artwork.

The station is currently undergoing a £400,000 refurbishment and restoring the installation back to its former glory forms part of the scheme.

Cate Watkinson, a stained glass expert, and her team are slowly cleaning and repairing the glass, replacing cracked panes and making it look as good as new.

She said: “I’m pleased to say that we’ve started the work of carefully restoring the stained glass art work from Monkseaton Metro station here at the National Glass Centre in Sunderland. This is a fantastic project to be involved in.”

Mike Davis incorporated stained glass into each end of Monkseaton’s glazed canopy in 1983.

It features two stunning pieces of stained glass art work. ‘Beach’, executed in a bold and colourful style, was designed from a schools competition won by Rosalind Hurst, while ‘Shipyards’ is a more abstract treatment of the River Tyne’s heritage.

“The first task is to take rubbings of the stained-glass window so that we can tell where all of the pieces need to go,” Cate continued.

“The broken bits of lead need to be removed, then we have to select the right colours from the sheets of glass that we have so we can cut them to size and replace panes which are cracked. The rubbings that we have taken helps us with this.”

Cate trained as a stained-glass artist under Mike Davis when she studied at the old Sunderland Polytechnic.

“We use the same lead that was used 40 years ago to hold the panes in place. These are then carefully soldered together,” added Cate.

“The last part of the process will involve cementing it in order to waterproof it and make the whole stained-glass window structurally sound, and less wobbly like it was before. Once all of this is done the window will look as good as new and can be put back into place at the Metro station.”

Nexus are also refurbishing the glazing and steel structures that make up the gable ends of the canopy to toughen the structure and make it more resistant to vandalism and bad weather.