This window was originally installed in Christchurch’s Barbadoes Street Cemetery Chapel of St George, in memory of the Venerable Octavius Mathias, Archdeacon of Akaroa, who died in 1864. The Chapel was demolished by the Christchurch City Council in 1955 and the window was briefly in private hands, until it was purchased by the Gallery. Stained glass work enjoyed a renaissance in Britain during the 19th century, coinciding with the development of the Gothic Revival style in architecture, the style of the Chapel of St. George. It was designed by the noted Christchurch architect B.W. Mountfort and completed in 1863. The window is thought to have been designed by Henry Casolani, who began working for James Powell & Sons c. 1860. Casolani is believed to have been born in Malta and trained in Rome, under the Nazarene painter Johann Friedrich Overbeck (1789-1869). Powell & Sons was one of the most prominent stained glass studios in Britain throughout the 19th and 20th centuries and continued producing stained glass windows until 1973.