Lilies (Corey Memorial Window)

About this artwork

This memorial window, dedicated to Francis Edwin Corey and his wife, Vernera Leonard Corey, is one of several that Louis Comfort Tiffany’s Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company designed for Christ Reformed Episcopal Church in Chicago. Tiffany used lilies in his stained glass a number of times; the Coreys may have been inspired to commission this design by the well-publicized Field of Lilies Window in Tiffany’s chapel at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Lilies were also considered...

Art Historical Context

Louis Comfort Tiffany’s *Lilies (Corey Memorial Window)* exemplifies the artist’s groundbreaking approach to stained glass at the turn of the twentieth century. Created between 1892 and 1895, the tall, slender panel was designed as a memorial and demonstrates Tiffany’s mastery of leaded Favrile glass—an iridescent material he developed and patented. The luminous surface captures shifting light, allowing the lilies to glow with subtle color gradations that evoke both delicacy and permanence. Tiffany’s studio elevated American decorative arts by treating glass as a fine-art medium rather than a purely architectural one. In this window, carefully selected pieces of Favrile glass are joined with delicate lead lines that define the flowers’ graceful stems and petals while permitting natural light to animate the composition. The result is both reverent and vibrant, perfectly suited to its commemorative purpose. Today the window resides in the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection of American art, where visitors can appreciate how Tiffany transformed a traditional ecclesiastical form into a modern expression of beauty and memory.