Plantation Productions captured this footage on their recent visit to the Pattern Maker’s shop, as part of a film they are making about the restoration of the Elder Park entranceway.
The Pattern Maker specialises in making traditional wooden patterns for architectural cast iron. When completed the pattern will be laid in damp sand to form a mould into which the molten iron is poured. This will create the lamps and lanterns that will soon light the way into the park.
Two new bespoke cast iron lamp standards will be manufactured based on architect’s drawings informed by details found in the Saracen Foundry catalogue. The Saracen Foundry of Walter MacFarlane and Company was one of Glasgow’s most successful and influential of the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries and has left a huge legacy of decorative ironwork that is found all over the world.
You can check out volumes of the catalogue here, and here. They are full of beautiful ornate ironwork, and are well worth a look. Have you seen any of these architectural features on a walk around Govan or Glasgow? There are lots to find.