Karl Parsons

Karl Bergemann Parsons (23 January 1884 – 30 September 1934) was a British stained glass artist associated with the Arts and Crafts movement.

Parsons was born in Peckham in south London on 23 January 1884, the 12th and youngest child of Arthur William Parsons (1838–1901), a foreign language translator, and Emma Matilda Parsons, née Bergemann (1837–1914). He was christened with the names Charles Bergemann, though the family always called him Karl, the name he was to use in later life.

From 1893 to 1898 he attended Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School at New Cross in south London.

One of Parsons' older sisters was the artist Beatrice Emma Parsons (1869–1955). Beatrice worked for a while in Christopher Whall's studio and when Parsons left school, Beatrice persuaded Whall to take him on as an apprentice. Whall it seems saw promise in Parsons' sketches. Apart from starting with Whall as a pupil-apprentice at Whall's Hammersmith studio, he also worked at Lowndes and Drury in Chelsea, this under Whall's supervision. He also attended Whall's classes at the L.C.C. Central School of Arts & Crafts.

He completed his apprenticeship in the 1900s and then worked as one of Whall's assistants. In September 1904 he began teaching at the Central School, initially as one of Whall's assistants and then as principal teacher of stained glass. One pupil was M. E. Aldrich Rope, cousin of Margaret Agnes Rope. Another pupil was Joan Fulleylove who worked with Mabel Esplin and in fact continued Esplin's work for the Anglican cathedral in Khartoum when Esplin could no longer do so.

Throughout the 1900s he was to assist Whall on his major commissions and in 1905 drew some of the illustrations for Whall's book Stained Glass Work this along with fellow student Edward Woore. Parsons assisted Whall with the windows for Gloucester Cathedral and also those for Canterbury Cathedral, Southwell Minster, Tonbridge School Chapel, and churches in Ashbourne, Ledbury and Burford.

In 1907 he married Grace Millicent Simmons. She too studied at the Central School and became an Arts and Crafts embroiderer.

In 1908 he worked with Whall on the design and execution of apse windows for Cape Town Cathedral and in that year set up his own studio at the Glass House in Fulham. In the same year he began work on his first independent commission, a series of windows for St Alban, Hindhead. He also exhibited three designs at the Royal Academy and 25 September 1908 saw the birth of his daughter Margaret Rosetta.