Chance Brothers & Co.

In 1822 Robert Lucas Chance bought the glassworks in Smethwick from Joseph Stock and Thomas and Philip Palmer. He was joined by John Hartley and his brother William, but after John Hartley's sons left the partnership after their father's death, the firm became Chance Brothers & Co. in 1836. In 1851 the firm supplied the glass for Crystal Palace. They made coloured glass from the later 1830s and set up a stained glass studio, which was relatively short-lived, closing in the mid-1860s. The firm supplied glass for some of the major studios of the nineteenth century, such as Clayton & Bell, Lavers, Barraud & Westlake and John Hardman & Co.

After the closure of the stained glass studio, their artists set up on their own, among them Samuel Evans and Thomas William Camm, who established Camm Bros with his brothers.

Further reading

'Glass Painters 1750–1850' Journal of the British Society of Master Glass-Painters, vol. xiii, no. 1 (1959–60), 330.

Thomas Stokes, 'W. E. Chance and the Revived Manufacture of Coloured Glass' Journal of the British Society of Master Glass-Painters, vol. v, no. 4 (1934), 170–6.

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Ascension with the Four Evangelists designer: John Pollard Seddon firm/studio: Chance Brothers & Co. 1865 Church of St John the Evangelist, Maindee, Newport east wall of the chancel

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View this record on the Stained Glass in Wales Catalogue