metal

This striking bespoke bench is a collaboration between artist blacksmith and sculptor Andrew Rowe and light artist Simon Fenoulhet.

Cardiff County Council commissioned the two artists to create the sculptural seating as part of the improvement of Delta Street - a key priority within the Cowbridge Road East Regeneration Strategy. The scheme reclaimed an area of highway to create new pedestrian public space at the heart of the busy shopping area of Canton. As well as designing a bespoke bench the artists also collaborated with the scheme engineer and planning officer on the overall shape of the space and location of trees. This was not a straightforward task since there are a number of services below the site including a gas pipe.

The bench itself is shaped like a small and a large ‘C’ interlocking. This shape is designed to allow groups of people to sit together in a more sociable way than is possible with a standard bench design. The two ‘C’ shapes are cantilevered from the central point and seem to hover over the pavement. At night, hidden lighting within the bench gives it a new lease of life, enhancing its shape and creating an attractive ambience for the night-time economy of Cowbridge Road East.

Delta Street is now a natural focal point along Cowbridge Road East and a popular resting place for shoppers and those on their lunch break!

Background

Blaenavon and its wider industrial landscape was rewarded in December 2000 when the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) inscribed the Blaenavon Industrial Landscape as a World Heritage Site under the 1972 World Heritage Convention for the protection of the World’s cultural and nature heritage. In its recommendation the UK Government outlined the significance of the area.

“The Blaenavon Industrial Landscape presents a large number of individual monuments of outstanding value within the context of a rich and continuous relict landscape, powerfully evocative of the Industrial Revolution. It is one of the prime areas in the world where the full social, economic and technological process of industrialisation through iron and coal production can be studied and understood.”

In January 2008 Celfwaith was appointed by Torfaen Borough Council to manage a public art design competition which would specifically seek craftspeople to develop proposals for public art in Blaenavon and for the Iron Trails. Eight craftspeople were selected to develop site-specific proposals which they presented to a large group of Blaenavon residents.

This exercise was intended to generate new ideas and approaches to public art by involving artists with great design and making skills but who perhaps had not had the opportunity to work at a larger scale or in the public realm before. It was also intended as preparatory design work for future years of Heads of the Valleys funding and to avoid the end of year scramble to spend allocated funding.

The Commission

Later in the year, Celfwaith was again appointed to help implement two public art projects in Blaenavon as part of the £1.7 million Blaenavon Town Centre Regeneration Scheme (2006-2009) which was funded by the Welsh Assembly Governments Physical Regeneration Fund and a Town Improvement Grant from the Department of Economy & Transportation.

Sue Hiley Harris was one of the eight craftspeople originally selected to develop public art proposals and it was one of her proposals for a location in Blaenavon known as the ‘gap site’, that had been particularly favoured by those who had attended the artists’ presentations. The site is a gap between two houses at the top of Broad Street, and was lacking any clear identity or purpose. It was unattractive and contributed very little to the character and vitality of the town centre.

Her proposal was to create a spiral shaped form in stone within the paved site, which would rise gradually out of the ground up to seat height. The top surface of the spiral is the same riven Blue Pennant Sandstone from Gwrhyd Quarry near Swansea that has been used as paving on the site and which is used throughout Blaenavon. However, these large blocks have a diamond-sawn finish on six sides and the top and sides were flamed to provide a precise, durable finish not subject to laminate.

Behind the spiral and following its curve, a number of corten steel posts are set into the ground, in the form of ‘pigs’- the bars of iron created during the steel-making process and transported throughout the world. Stamped onto the pigs are the names of countries that iron was sent to from Blaenavon. As the spiral emerges from the ground, and as the ‘pigs’ gradually increase in height, reference is made to how natural minerals were taken from the ground in this area of South Wales and formed into valuable assets to be traded.

Sue Hiley Harris designed this artwork with landscaping advice and support from Andrew Nevill. The stone is from Gwrhyd Quarry and the corten steel ‘pigs’ were fabricated by DAR Design.

The vision for this project was to create a new park with a variety of play facilities out of an empty, flat field. Artist Andrew Small was selected to collaborate with landscape architect Ian Maddox on the overall design of the park and to create bespoke play structures.

Background

In October 2006, a report ‘Opportunities for Public Art in Adamsdown’ was commissioned by Cardiff Council to identify opportunities for public art in Adamsdown. Consultation was carried out with the local people of Adamsdown over a three month period and the report identified particular sites and themes for public art, which included suggestions that:

• The work should be uniquely created for the area
• The work, no matter what format it takes, should endeavour to be interactive in some way e.g. kinetic art, tactile art, evolving or changing work
• It should not be a traditional image of public art i.e. Bronze figures/statues like in Queens Street
• The work should challenge or push the viewer, and not be afraid to make a statement
• Sufficient time is taken in the development process of artwork to ensure that the community can build a sense of ownership towards it.

Project

In the summer of 2007 Cardiff County Council embarked on a project to transform an empty field in Adamsdown into a valuable amenity for the local community.

Artist Andrew Small was appointed to collaborate with landscape architect Ian Maddox on the overall design of the new park. Their task was to make the flat open space, used primarily by dog walkers and rarely used by children to play, into a flexible park and play area. The Council held a number of consultation events to find out what the local community wanted and did not want within the scheme.

Among other needs and constraints, Andrew Small and Ian Maddox aimed to create:

• sheltered spaces, since the field was windswept at times
• a designated space for children to play, where dog walkers would not go
• a defined ‘kick about’ area which allowed enough space for a game of football but which could also be safely walked around by others using the park
• creative play equipment aimed at a younger age group (11 and under)
• pathways and seating so that the whole of the space would be used
The result is a park with three main areas:
1. a defined play area at the front (along Constellation Road) with play structures designed and made by Andrew Small on a child safe surface;
2. a kick about area in the middle of the field with low mounding around it on both sides to define the space and protect people walking along the path from finding themselves in the middle of a game!
3. A less formal play area at the back of the field with a high mound incorporating a slide and other structures around it for climbing, swinging and jumping off.

Having developed a number of concept designs for various play structures, Andrew Small was commissioned to create two of them and consulted with a Health and Safety specialist at the detailed design stage. Andrew then fabricated these two structures which he called the Spending Time Machine and the Triphid. The Spending Time Machine is a curved wooden platform with a series of stainless steel arches above it as a roof. Children climb inside it and on top of it, and slide and run up and down the curved surface. It can be anything they want it to be – a space ship, a boat, a house, a den, a tunnel, a submarine, a cave and so on. It is a structure which allows their imagination free rein.

The Triphid is a climbing and balancing structure in galvanised steel, painted a deep blue. The tentacles can be climbed, swung on, walked along, and the soft ‘wet pour’ surface on the ground ensures that children can be more adventurous and risk falling off. The coloured patterns on the soft surface complement the Triphid and can form part of its use in a game.

These days, at the time when the school day has just finished you’ll see many children making full use of Anderson Field, whereas before the park was created, it would have been an empty site.

read more at
http://www.andrewsmall.org.uk/Andrew_Small/Blog/Entries/2010/3/14_Anders...