Rachel Mulligan
by Andrew Morris

Rachel is a talented Surrey artist whose personal mission is to share her love of stained glass and to help ensure the survival of this endangered craft. Brought up in Richmond and now living in Godalming, Rachel studied Fine Art in Coventry before discovering her passion for stained glass and pursuing a specialist Postgraduate Qualification at Central Saint Martins College of Art. She was voted Surrey Artist of the Year in 2014, resulting in one of her many exhibitions, at the New Ashgate Gallery in Farnham. And in 2024 she won the first Glass Painters and Glaziers award for a panel prompted by renowned glass artist Alf Fisher’s work. Alf is one of Rachel’s main inspirations and she has worked closely with him, writing and illustrating a book about his life. Excited particularly by mediaeval art, and also by the way her chosen craft melds colour with changing light, Rachel has created a body of her own work in and around Surrey that will stand the test of time. And although her techniques may be traditional, she will also draw on contemporary themes. Head to the Godalming Museum to see Rachel’s Labours of the Months Collection, twelve panels depicting a year and the changing seasons on her allotment, reflecting the social side of gardening, alongside the hard work and bountiful produce. May is Rachel’s favourite month. She loves the seasonal cow parsley, and the palette of green shades offered up by nature at that time of year. She created The Lady of Chinthurst in 2021, featuring oak trees, owls and cow parsley on Chinthurst Hill near Guildford for a beautiful local Arts & Crafts house. And Leith Hill Place, home of composer Ralph Vaughn Williams, was the inspiration for her exhibition panel The Lark Ascending, depicting billowing cow parsley, flowering horse chestnut trees and the eponymous birds in springtime. Charterhouse school relocated from London to Godalming in 1872. Windows for its chapel were commissioned shortly afterwards from the Victorian firm of Clayton & Bell. But fashions change and the stained glass was removed in the 1930s and put into storage. The glass was rescued from two fires before finding its way into Rachel’s Farncombe studio, where she redesigned and re-leaded some of the windows before they were returned to Charterhouse, in the form of striking new panels, to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the famous school’s move to Surrey. Rachel has a passion for sharing her love of stained glass and holds frequent workshops and classes in her own studio. One of her students created a delightful panel in a single day, using fragments of Charterhouse glass and following a process that has barely changed in a thousand years. You can see the results of Rachel’s own passion at St Nicolas Church in Cranleigh, St Nicholas in Peper Harow, Haslemere Museum (where she has three windows) and in many homes all around Surrey, preserving this ancient but endangered craft for our beautiful county. https://www.rachelmulligan.co.uk/ https://www.rachelmulligan.co.uk/portfolio-gallery-pieces/ https://www.rachelmulligan.co.uk/portfolio-public-art/