Wrought Iron Architectural Metalwork
Designed & manufactured in the U.K
By: Chris Topp & Co Ltd, North Yorkshire
Tel: 01845 501415
In 1998 Chris Topp & Co were contacted by the town of Fareham in Hampshire to design and supervise a public art project based upon the famous former local resident Henry Cort, the ‘Father of Puddled Iron’. In 1784 Henry Cort patented a revolutionary method of producing wrought iron in industrial quantities using coal as fuel and thus played a major role in enabling the Industrial Revolution.
We decided to hold a trans-european competition to design twelve items of iron-based artwork to garnish a new pedestrian area in West Street. The first round of the competition raised entries from 105 smiths who submitted a total of nearly seven hundred designs! Obviously there had to be a selection procedure, so we organised a second round by selecting 36 designers and paying each a small design fee to resubmit. The entries were judged by a committee of locals and experts and the winners identified as follows;
Michael Haase from Germany
Jouko Nieminen from Finland
Ryszard Mazur from Poland
Igor Andrukhin from Russia
Edward Fokin from Russia
Vladimir Sokhonovich from Russia
Chris Brammall from Cumbria
Steven Lunn from Northumberland
Kate and Rick from Yorkshire
Charles Normandale
So we had three Russians who between them had to make four large sculptures, but at a time when the Russian banks could not be trusted, how were we going to pay them? Not to mention being able to check on the work as it progressed.
The answer we agreed on was for them to come to Yorkshire where we would set up a special workshop in a barn we were able to rent from a farmer in the village of Carlton Husthwaite. The Russians didn’t need work permits because they were in fact bringing their own work into Britain. So the barn was fitted out with two fires and an old steam hammer borrowed from Beamish Museum and the three Russians moved in together into a north Yorkshire cottage. Well, it wasn’t long before they made their mark; in fact the village had never seen the like before. What with drinking the pub dry, and the road accidents, and their constant walking up and down the village street, during the eight months they were here between their workshop and ours, they soon became village personalities.
To mark the occasion we decided to hold a blacksmiths’ gathering or ‘forge-in’ in the farm workshop. We rented another of the farmer’s barns, duly cleaned of cow manure, and installed a stage for the band and a bar. A hog was purchased and the spit set up, the camping field opened up and fifty blacksmiths turned up for the weekend. Igor and Edward had designed a sculpture for the assembled smiths to make over the two days, following the ethos of the Fareham sculptures, to be made from recycled wrought iron, in this case old fencing bars. And so the Flower was born.
To mark the end of their stay – their families having come to live in the village by this time – they wanted to put on a party for the village. So we had a Russian evening with Russian food prepared by Lena, Russian dancing by Galya and vodka of course for the adults. Everyone came. It was a great celebration, which went on till well after midnight, when Igor made a speech and presented the flower to the assembled villagers.
And there it stands on the village green, and apart from the brass plaque with the names of the designers, as time passes the events of that year will be forgotten, but this small north Yorkshire village still treasures its bit of Russian modern art.
