Royal Court crest now looks as good as new

Following about 70 hours of intricate renovation work which spanned the last couple of months, the crest has now been returned to the entrance of the Royal Court building.

It is about three feet wide and weighs about 60kg.

Before being hand-painted by one of the few remaining traditional signwriters still working in the island, it was sand-blasted down to its cast iron base by Nick Vinning.

‘We used a very long-lasting, robust paint, which should last at least 20 years,’ said Dowding signs owner Dave Dowding.

‘But the gold on it will last even longer because it’s real gold and that doesn’t tarnish.’

Twenty-three-and-a-half-carat gold was used, which is as close to pure gold as can be employed for the job.

The renovation process went well, but was a long one. Once the paint had been stripped off, it became clear that one element of the crest needed further repair work as it had come loose.

At 1pm yesterday three staff from Dowding Signs, with the help of a Martin Le Prevost crane operator, hoisted the crest up above the door to the Royal Court.

For a while it was thought the scaffolding that had been erected would need to be adjusted, but the team managed to fix it to the wall smoothly without need for a delay.

‘It’s fastened to brackets which are already in the building and have been checked,’ Mr Dowding said.

‘There’s always a bit of nervousness about letting go of something you’ve spent a long time on, and this has been a key feature of the workshop for some time now, but we were confident it would all go well.’

There are very few of these crests around and even fewer people on the island with the traditional skills to carry out a renovation of this kind, so for the team at Dowding Signs it was an exciting project to work on.