Muckross House was built for Henry Arthur Herbert and his wife, the water-colourist Mary Balfour Herbert. This was actually the fourth house that successive generations of the Herbert family had occupied at Muckross over a period of almost two hundred years. William Burn, the well-known Scottish architect, was responsible for its design. Building commenced in 1839 and was completed in 1843.
Recclesia completed a full survey of the windows prior to their removal to our workshops in the UK in two phases, where extensive repair work was undertaken to the Hope metal casements and the leaded light glazing. The steel casements were severely corroded thanks to the environmental conditions and in some cases sections had disintegrated entirely.
The casements were stripped down entirely, all of the brass and bronze working parts removed and returned to working order, and the steel frames carefully repaired in our metal conservation workshops. New bronze furniture was cast where it was missing using the lost-wax process to faithfully reproduce the original castings. The leaded glazing was stripped down and the original glass rebuilt into new cames at our glass conservation studio. In some cases, the plain-glazed casements were upgraded using slim double glazing units in lieu of the original single glazing.
Muckross House is a must on any itinerary for visting this part of the world - it is a truly stunning location and all the better for such lovely windows!