Having previously worked on several projects for the Tower of London, the Longbottom team were delighted to be asked by Historic Royal Palaces to supply new hopper heads with the King’s cypher to top the drainpipes on this historic building.
A royal cypher is the sovereign’s monogram, consisting of the monarch’s initials and title; in this case, Rex, Latin for King, alongside a representation of the crown. HRH King Charles, selected the cypher from a series of designs created by the ancient College of Arms, founded in 1484. The cypher appears on government buildings, state documents and post boxes. Replacing the cyphers of Queen Elizabeth II with those of the new King will be a phased and gradual process.
We were sent a drawing of the new cypher and needed to create a motif to fit onto a hopper head, a No. 42. First, we had to scale the drawing to a size appropriate for the front of the hopper and agree on a font to use for the numbers making up the year of installation, 2024.
Once the design layout was approved, we had the tricky process of working out how to make the cypher fit seamlessly onto the hopper head. We often create motifs like this in cast iron, then fit them to the heads. In this case, because of the design, the cypher would have been mounted onto a thin plate and fitted to the hopper, raised up in an unsightly way.
Fortunately, we had a spare pattern for the No.42 and were able to modify the design so that the motif was cast directly onto the front as the head is moulded, giving a very neat result.
The hopper heads were primed and then sent to the contractor for final painting, with an application of gold paint to create a very regal finish.