Sculpture for Memorials and Commemoration

Memorial work carries a responsibility the rest of the catalogue does not. The piece has to be right the first time, because there is no revision after a name is cut and no acceptable delay once a date has been announced. Our process reflects that. Inscription artwork is proofed at full size, printed and wrapped around a timber mock-up on the actual site, and signed off physically before a single letter is cut. Material choice leans towards marble and bronze because both are read as permanent and both age gracefully; corten is occasionally right where the setting is landscape rather than architectural. Legibility is engineering, not typography: letter height is calculated from the reading distance, and contrast is achieved through the relationship between polished ground and cut face rather than through paint, which fails. We plan memorial programmes backwards from the commemoration date with float built in, and we do not compress the approval stages to recover time, because that is where mistakes become permanent.