In 2021 we carried out our first proper restoration as a business. The restoration in question was a set of traditional wrought iron flatbar gates.
As we now commonly come across on heritage ironwork, several inappropriate repairs had been carried out to the gates at some stage in their life in an effort to maintain their useability. These included the use of modern welding and the substitution of the correct material section for something else. In the case of these gates the top bar which was originally T-section was replaced with angle iron of a smaller size.
Once we had identified all the inappropriate repairs, we came up with a plan to rectify them, using traditional techniques which would have been used when the gate was originally made. This mainly consisted of removing all the welded in components and instead riveting everything back together as well as reinstating T-section on the top bar in place of the angle iron.
The gates were then repainted in a moss green and rehung from their original hinges.
Being our first proper restoration we learned a great deal which we took forward into following heritage work.
