These 2 hand painted flower roundels are part of the same set of panels left on top of a building in London Docklands and originally from the grand Victorian house of 'Springfield' in Gateshead owned by
Sir John Maccoy. The themes in this once huge panel are varied;
armorial, navigation, heraldic, organic / decorative, the seasons, botanical as well as a collection of strange looking insects. It is hard to see how it all came together, perhaps it was one central large panel with a collection of side panels or maybe they came from different parts of the house, doors / upper windows / stairwell etc. The panels must have come from a well established studio with multiple painters as some pieces are of very high quality and others more like apprentice work. It is still unknown which studio got the commission to make the panels for 'Springfield', later panels donated by Sir John Maccoy in
Gateshead Old Town Hall were made by the Gateshead firm Thompson and Snee. Sadly according the
Gateshead Local History Society no photo of the old house exists.
Rose panel before cleaning.
After cleaning, new border to be added, colour to be decided.
Daisies panel before cleaning.
Sadly a further crack was starting to run and it is safer to run the crack in a controlled way.
Cleaned pieces waiting for gluing with Araldite 20/20, a conservation glue recommended for not yellowing over time. Border colours to be decided...
No comments:
Post a Comment