Historic English Gate

Historic English Gate. . , In 1913, Sarah Pell went to Europe looking for artifacts to furnish the King’s Garden and Fort grounds. At a shop in London specializing in historic architectural fragments and antique garden ornaments, she found a set of “leaf work gates of the William and Mary period” that the dealer considered the finest he had ever seen., This gate came from one of the great manor houses of Enfield, formerly the hunting grounds of English kings and now the northernmost borough of the City of London. The scroll and water leaf design elements, panel assemblies and arrow-shaped “dog bars” precisely match two nearby gates known to have been made by a blacksmith named Warren who worked in the early 1700s during a spectacular renaissance of the art of ironwork that lasted through the middle of the 18th century., For nearly 90 years, this wrought iron gate greeted every visitor at the entrance to Fort Ticonderoga. After a major accident with a delivery truck and complete restoration of the entire structure, Fort curators decided to relocate the gate to ensure its survival. Now you can approach on foot and take the time to appreciate the details of decoration that carry the eye around the sweep and flow of curving leaves and scrolls., Restoration revelations , Master blacksmith William Senseney spent an entire year restoring the damaged gate. He learned a great deal about its makers from the process of reassembling their work., The physical evidence tells us that Warren oversaw a substantial shop focused on the business of making wrought iron gates and fences. Many smiths hammered at a number of forges, each specializing in a component of the gate scrolls, dog bars, water leaf assemblies, and the flamboyant acanthus leaf clusters and central crest that crown the over-throw. Other workers attached the details to frames using three different fastening techniques: mortise and tenon (similar to woodworking joinery), rivets, and u-shaped brackets attached to a plate called “collars.” Collaring is a technique unique to European manufacture. The fitting could be done without additional heat (wrought iron is strong and malleable), and left enough space between parts to allow for the slight differences in each handmade component.