On Thursday the entire team downed tools and headed off on a sunny day trip to Wolverhampton! Andy wanted to introduce the Ironart team to some of our suppliers, to give everyone an insight into different aspects of the architectural metalwork “supply chain” and how it all works.

First we visited Legg Brothers steel rolling mill and soaked up the atmosphere inside their vast workshop. An awe-inspiring series of complex industrial machinery and some seriously heavy-duty manpower in full rhythmical production. It was an impressive sight.

Next we headed over to the fascinating Aladdin’s cave that is Barr and Grosvenor casting foundry on Jenner Street, where we met with Dominic and Lynn Grosvenor and their team for a full tour of their casting workshop. Dominic is a passionate advocate of traditional casting techniques and it was an absolute pleasure to meet him and a real treat to see his team of craftsmen at work in this unique environment. They kindly topped off our visit with a delicious lunch for which we were really grateful.

Finally our day ended with a whistle-stop tour of Edward Howell Galvanizing plant in Wolverhampton courtesy of Jim Lindsay and Kevin Addiss, where we all gazed in wonder at their enormous warehouses full of acid dip-baths and vats of hot moulten zinc. They were hard at work dipping rack upon rack of metal palisade fence posts…we’ll never look at palisade fencing again without remembering this experience!

Thank you so much to our generous hosts for giving up their time and energy to enlighten us, we absolutely loved it!