HE’S a larger than life figure, modelled on Eric Morecambe.
And this two-tonne giant is set to become a familiar figure in his new home – outside a Huddersfield foundry.
The sculpture has been created as a novel directional sign for the H Downs & Sons iron foundry in Leeds Road.
It was commissioned by Alan and Nigel Downs, joint managing directors of the firm, which is based at Peacock Works.
The foundry turns out 30 to 40 pieces of art each year on top of the engineering castings that are its bread and butter.
Nigel Downs said: “We thought it would be both fun and informative to have something different, like a statue sign.
“Dave Bradbury has done work with us in the past so we commissioned him to do the work.
“We asked him to produce several ideas with the idea of it being foundry-related, friendly and directional”.
Dave, 42, of Shepley, returned to his sculpting days after being made redundant from an architect’s office three months ago.
He said: “The figure is strongly influenced by Eric Morecambe, who used to wander across the back of the stage at the end of each of his television shows, complete with Gannex raincoat, flat cap and scarf.
“I spent two weeks carving the model in polystyrene and then that was taken into the foundry where it was moulded in sand.
Molten iron was then poured into the mould and the sculpture was cast. What began as a 4kg lump of polystyrene is now 1,600kg of cast iron, with the firm’s nameplate picked out in aluminium.
Mr Bradbury added: “I think Holmfirth could benefit from such a figure celebrating the works from the Bamforth illustrations.”
