Pike Stained Glass is a more than century-old family business in Rochester that creates and repairs stained and leaded glass windows and panels.

Pike’s colorful and creative work decorates hundreds of churches, businesses, and colleges. There are more than 850 original Pike Stained Glass designs throughout the region and beyond, thanks to the hard work of Valerie O’Hara, a third-generation designer and stained-glass artist.

“We are so proud of being able to work with some of the most intelligent and generous people because we wouldn’t have a job if it wasn’t for the donors who give the money for the windows in the church," O'Hara said. 

Each piece of glass is hand cut, and O’Hara creates the design.

"After about 100 years, a window can fatigue and we have to remove it from the opening and take it apart and put it all back together again exactly the way it was," O'Hara said. "So, when St. Pius burned down four years ago, they asked the Diocese if there were any existing windows, as over the years some have been removed as churches closed, and they found Pike Stained Glass windows that we made 100 years ago, so we are incorporating them into the new larger openings that we are working on now.”

For a designer, working in this medium is anything but traditional.

“There is a scale drawing that is usually an inch to a foot and that is done in watercolor and then the full-size drawing eventually becomes the patterns that we cut the class from and assemble the window on," she said.

O’Hara started working with her dad at the studio when she was just 10 years old.

"One of my first jobs was to paint the details on the glass," she said. "It has not changed much since the 12th century, and so the only differences is we have electricity for our soldering irons and we use a steel wheel cutter to cut the glass, but because of the similarities, the tools are very simple.”