Lauren Puckett, manager for the Art, Art History and Visual Studies studios at Duke University, is a trained artist in stained glass. She led Duke Arts' Arts+ experience: Illuminated: Education Through the Re-Creation of Historic Stained Glass. (Photo and illustration by Jess Abel/Trinity Communications)
A Window into Community
Inspiration has a way of popping up in unexpected places. Sometimes, it begins by simply noticing something others have overlooked.
For Lauren Puckett, manager for the Art, Art History and Visual Studies studios, inspiration came in the form of a broken and boarded-up stained-glass window in an aging Durham church.
"I'm an artist trained in stained glass, so every time I drove past, that window was all I could see," she explains.
What began as her altruistic desire to restore a piece of local history became the catalyst for Arts+ Illuminated: Education Through the Re-Creation of Historic Stained Glass, one of four undergraduate experiences grounded in the arts and offered by Duke Arts this summer.
“The more I thought about that window, the more I realized it could be an opportunity for students to not only preserve a piece of Durham’s history and give back to the community but also learn a craft that's been passed down for centuries," Puckett shares.
Led by Puckett and guided by project manager Rose Ansari, a Duke Ph.D. candidate in Computational Media, Arts and Culture, Arts+ Illuminated brought together students from three institutions: Kharisma Burrow from Durham Technical Community College, Ansari and Sukrit Pai from Duke and Kendall Perry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Kendall Perry's glass project highlights the craftsmanship behind the centuries-old lead came technique.
Every edge matters: Kharisma Burrow (left) and Sukrit Pai cut and sand glass as they bring their projects to life.
Precision is key as Rose Ansari prepares each piece of glass for its final form.
Over the six weeks, they learned an impressive range of glass techniques:
- Lead came: The traditional stained-glass method in which cut pieces of glass are soldered together using flexible lead strips called came.
- Tiffany method: A technique developed by Louis Comfort Tiffany where each piece of glass is wrapped with adhesive copper foil before being soldered together.
- Draping: A kiln-forming technique in which heated glass softens and drapes over a mold to create curved or sculptural forms.
- Slumping: Another kiln-forming technique that uses heat to shape a flat sheet of glass into a three-dimensional form by allowing it to sink into or over a mold.
Puckett’s philosophy for the students was simple: learn by doing.
There were no lengthy demonstrations or lectures. On the first day, she handed the students three stained-glass patterns and sent them straight to the workbench. They learned by cutting glass, fitting lead came and soldering joints, remaking cracked pieces as often as they celebrated successful ones. By the time they turned their efforts to repairing the window, their abilities — and confidence — had become instinctive.
And Puckett’s philosophy for herself was just as simple: lead by doing.
Rather than serving as an instructor who “taught from the front of the room,” she spent the six weeks working alongside the students as a member of the team: cutting glass, soldering joints and solving problems as everyone learned, created and built trust together.
"The students didn’t want to leave the studio," Puckett says with a laugh. "They were here every day, arriving early, staying late, offering feedback and helping one another. Their enthusiasm was endless, and before long the studio had become a true community where everyone shared responsibility for the work and celebrated each other’s success.”
But the camaraderie didn’t end when the window was completed. As the four moved on to designing and building their own Tiffany, lead came and kiln-formed projects, they regularly gathered around each other's benches to offer feedback, troubleshoot challenges, grab a photo or celebrate breakthroughs. They also transformed reclaimed building materials into a hand-cranked kaleidoscope, crowning it with a stained-glass mandala assembled from individual, wedge-shaped panels.
A work in progress, the stained-glass mandala begins to take shape as the individual sections are assembled.
"The students didn’t want to leave the studio," Puckett said. "Their enthusiasm was endless."
The completed kaleidoscope in the studio, with the assembled mandala.
While each student, and Puckett, designed a panel reflecting distinct artistic choices, the mandala's full beauty emerged when the pieces were joined together, becoming a fitting symbol for how creativity flourishes within a community and how contributions are strongest when they are part of something larger.
By the end of six weeks, the students had learned far more than how to cut glass and solder seams. They discovered that glass is much stronger than it first appears and that remaking a broken piece isn't failure — it's part of the process. They learned to balance creativity with precision, patience with problem-solving and individual expression with collaboration while discovering that centuries-old craftsmanship still has a place in the modern world. Most importantly, they experienced firsthand how art builds community, bringing people together around a shared purpose while leaving something meaningful behind.
"This is why the arts matter," Puckett says. "Not because everyone will become a stained-glass artist, but because making something with your hands changes the way you see the world. It teaches you to solve problems, to care for something beyond yourself, to discover what becomes possible when people create together."