ABOUT THE PROJECT

• Preperation off-site: 3 weeks
• Installation on site: 2 days

We were approached by the Silver End Parish Council to replace a historic Japanese Torii gate that had originally stood in the Silver End Memorial gardens in Witham, Essex.

Silver End is synonymous with the nearby CRITTALL Window factory and the gardens were for the benefit of the factory workers who lived in the Crittall village houses built around the park.

The only information that we had to work from were a couple of historic photos of the original Torii gate. This is a substantial structure and our design carefully replicated the hexagonal support posts and all the timber used was cut from green Oak, then sanded, primed, and finished in a ‘bottle’ green wood paint as specified by the Parish Council.

Due to the size and weight of the Torii gate we fabricated two steel sockets that were concreted into the ground to support the posts.  These also reflected the material from which Crittall windows are made as a homage to the founder Francis Berrington Crittall and his family.