Washington National Cathedral Tour - Gorgeous Stained Glass

Over the weekend I got up close and personal with stain glass windows in the Washington National Cathedral.

During my tour we explored the windows often harder to see from the ground floor and got up close and personal with the famous Creation Rose Window; a corner stone of the cathedral.  

However the real surprise was the meticulously carved smaller windows that can only be accessed from the stair corridors of the cathedral. These corridors are blocked off to most visitors, so it was a real treat to see these windows.

MISC Windows

Below are series of windows dedicated to different bible characters including: Moses, Solomon, Rebekah, Isaiah, Ruth and David

Here are some more abstract windows that seem to be depicting a similar dome in various locations. Perhaps the Washington Monument? Our docent tour guide was unsure.

Another theme was flowers and farm land. The etching on these windows is incredible! 

The Washington National Cathedral is the sixth largest cathedral in the world and hosts 215 stained glass windows! As you can image, we had to pick and choose where to focus on.

One of the highlights, of course, was a up close view of the Creation Rose Window.

The Creation Rose Window

Created as a tribute to Gods' famous line "Let there be light"; the Rose Window is a mosaic of more than 10,000 meticulously painted glass pieces. While visitors of the cathedral can get a wonderful view from the first floor, the real artistry can only be seen up close!

For reference this is a picture of the window from down in the pews that I took with Snapchat.

Up close you can really see all the little pieces of glass and the stunning color that comes through.

Here is a shot of one of the lower flowers.

Here you can even see the signatures of the window artisan Rowan LeCompte and fabricator Diter Goldkuhle.

During the construction of the window, Rowan's wife passed away. In order to commemorate her, he placed her favorite crystal paper weight (the larger white ball) into the window after her death.

Only up here can you see the individual etching that was applied to each piece. I was stunned!

Next we toured through the south-side Te Deum windows that lead down the center of the cathedral. These windows, along with those on the north side, depict the transition from the Great Choir to the High Alter. Interestingly, the south windows are integrated with State based themes as well.

South-side Te Deum Windows

Starting in the old- testament, the first window in the south side series depicts the great 40 day flood and Noah's ark.

At the top of each window is smaller image summarizing its individual message, here you see a small dove with an olive branch. Our docent explained that this symbolizes the Noah's Ark story and more importantly the peace that came after it. This window has ton of meticulous detail; including animals in the ark and farmers planting a vineyard after finding land.

The story then continues as Christianity and the State are born.

This next window depicts some general suffering, but the far right panel is meant to reveal some hopeful foreshadowing. There you can see Jews being persecuted in the same fashion Jesus will be later on.

In the next two panels the people begin to learn of Jesus and rejoice. However, you can still see that all suffering is not gone just yet.

I love the rainbow at the top in this one!

Now we start getting into the State theme. Here the top window depicts the supreme court and at the bottom is inscribed "We the people of the Untied States".

The next window continues along this path with the establishment of the White House. At the bottom is says "In order to form a more perfect union".

Next depicts the Good Samaritan bible story which is aligned with the creation of the state legislator. The artist wanted to evoke the sense that the legistator was created to look out for the little people, to be a good samaritan for those wronged by others.

To finish out the State creation, this window has the next line of the preamble to the constitution: "Do ordain and establish this constitution"

With the creation of the State complete, the south side story finishes out into the establishment of the church with these last two windows. On the north side, it picks up again and leads to the final resurrection day.

While I personally do not agree with everything these windows are trying to convey, I do appreciate their beauty. I really enjoyed take these incredible shots of the mid-day sun shining through the glass. I hope you enjoyed them as well, thanks for reading!