By Andy Sevilla

The colors are vibrant, the detail is measured and intricate, and the final product a masterpiece. Cathy Shaw, who has created countless stained-glass windows in Kyle, may soon take her business to Minnesota.

Shaw said she has been constructing stained-glass windows and other items for 35 years. And for the past 20 years, her work has come from the Arrowhead Trading Company, a 1930s building that sits on Old Highway 81 in southern Kyle, which once served as a restaurant — the Arrowhead Café — for rail passengers along the now-Union Pacific line.

“It’s a bit of Texas history right here,” Shaw said of the 2,400 square-foot building. Though it presently houses Shaw’s business, she said it has served as a restaurant, gym, antique shop, printing company, another restaurant, and for the last 20 years, her studio.

Shaw said she has had the building, which also comes with about a half-acre lot immediately to the south, on the market for about three weeks. She’s asking for $406,000.

Shaw said her decision to sell, leave the city she’s called home for 30 years, and relocate to the north came after her son and granddaughter moved to Minnesota. Shaw said she wants to be there and see her granddaughter grow up.

“The biggest issue is can I handle the cold in Minnesota?” Shaw said. “That is the biggest issue. It’s really, really cold. It was brutal last year … but every time I see my granddaughter smile I’ll warm up.”

Since her days in college, Shaw said, she’s felt destined to create stained-glass pieces.

“I don’t know why … I always felt compelled to make it,” she said.

At one point during her college career at then-Southwest Texas State University, Shaw said, she built a big chest of drawers with double-doors sitting atop. Shaw said she knew stained glass needed to fill in the doors.

Shaw didn’t know how to make stained-glass windows then, but she said sooner or later she’d learn, and she did. That’s when her career in stained-glass makings began.

“And I still have that piece of furniture at my house,” she said.

Also at the Arrowhead Trading Co. Shaw sells local honey captured from several of her hives around Kyle.

“I am a beekeeper,” she said. “My hives did really well this year. I have hives in different ranches around town, which is why you get the different colors of honey — the different flowers that the bees bring in.”

Shaw said she took up beekeeping about 11 years ago, after learning about the practice from friends in San Marcos. 

Shaw said she’s extracted honey from her hives twice this year. She said the rains the area received past fall, winter and spring caused many flowers to bloom, “which means we get honey.”

Shaw extracted honey in the first week of June, and again in the first week of July. She said the honey the bees are now producing will remain in her hives, as the little critters need it for food this upcoming winter.

“I won’t take anything else of the bees now, because it’s their food. They need to have their wintering food — so they got what they’re going to keep — and I won’t steal anymore,” she said laughing.

Shaw said she ended up with over 40 gallons of honey for the year, and a lot of it, differing in color and taste, is for sale at her shop.

And if stained-glass creations and beekeeping wasn’t enough, Shaw said she’s taken up a new craft.

For the past year-and-a-half Shaw has created light boxes that can serve as night-lights. Shaw transfers photos onto glass panels, which line a side of the box, which are illuminated with a light inside.

“It’s a cigar box, and then it’s a glass panel that I’ve transferred a photograph into,” she said. “They’re fun, my newest obsession still including glass.”

Shaw said she’d remain at her studio and in Kyle until her building sells. Until then, she continues manipulating colored glass — creating scenes, portraits, objects and other things — which adorn many windows across the state.