In 1944 he returned to England and took up a post with the British Council, serving firstly in London, then in Cambridge from 1948–1952, in Brussels from 1952–54, and from 1954–59 as Director of the British Institute in Paris, and 1963–68 in Amsterdam, and Turkey from 1970 to 1973. These periods of residence furthered his research on 16th-century glass, and he formed friendships with other stained-glass scholars.
