Dianne Lee and Her Stained Glass Bungalow
For a lot of people, buying a house changes everything. You’re making a move from another city, your family is growing and you need more space, kids are going off to college and you need to downsize…the list goes on. However, for Dianne Lee, owner and craftswoman of Stained Glass Bungalow, buying a house truly changed her entire life.
Originally from Atlanta, Dianne decided to move away from the bigger metropolitan area and head a little farther north to the valleys and mountains of Waynesville, North Carolina to raise her son. “There was a certain simplicity of living that sent me there”, Dianne recounts. I can vouch for her on that front as I was born and raised in Asheville, North Carolina just a few minutes east of Waynesville and I can’t quite seem to get away, which suits me just fine.
As Dianne refurbished and cleaned their new-to-them 1920s bungalow she stumbled upon a handful of Asheville Citizen newspapers from World War II and that’s where her story begins. “I researched everything about that era, particularly the mission style furniture — solid as a rock”, she says. “Living in this historic structure really began to inspire me.”
From there she began to build on her craft, which started with lessons in Atlanta while living there but was always just a passion. Dianne eventually turned her passion into a business, the Stained Glass Bungalow, where she creates just about anything out of glass you can imagine. “I want the beauty of stained glass to be available to anyone in any room of their house.” From custom entryways to simple single panes to solving the problem of moisture control for stained glass windows in bathrooms to incorporating the smooth lines of Oceana glass in her pieces — Dianne does it all.
She’s keeping herself busy these days with a slew of commissions she received during this past year’s National Arts & Crafts Conference in particular. She’s also diving into an exciting new project centered around her inspiration drawn from a large, yet widely unknown, collection of Frank Lloyd Wright woodcuts. Also keep an eye out for a fun holiday treat as Diane teams up with paper artist Pat Queen as they create handmade greeting cards with Arts & Crafts style stained glass ornaments inside. An easy way to say hello to your loved ones during the hustle and bustle of the season.
As for the future of her work, “I love every second of it”, she says. “It’s a painful art with lots of cuts and scrapes but I’m enamored by it.” The perfect set up — in love with your work and constantly inspired by the house that started it all, that sweet little 1920s Stained Glass Bungalow.
To learn more about Stained Glass Bungalow products and to stay up to date on Dianne and her current and upcoming projects be sure to take a minute and check out her website, www.stainedglassbungalow.com
