A welcome return to Paradise

The statues of James Watt and Joseph Priestley, two titans of the Industrial Revolution and both adopted Brummies, are on their way home.

By Ross Fittall, regional development director at Federated Hermes MEPC

But locating them back to Paradise has been a long journey.

As well as cleaning and re-assembling the stone plinths the statues stand upon, the figures themselves have had an amount of repair work carried out, all under the close scrutiny of expert restorers and stonemasons over the past months.

Originally dating from 1868 (Watt) and 1874 (Priestley), the statues are now almost one hundred and sixty years old. And our job now is to ensure they survive for another hundred and sixty years.

Thanks to the expertise of our specialist contractors – Midland Masonry, Ian Clark Restoration and Allelys – the statues will shortly be on their way back to Paradise to take up their rightful places on Ratcliff Passage – a spot that corresponds almost exactly to their original Victorian location.

Removed for safe-keeping in 2015, the statues have been cared for since then by Birmingham Museums Trust as the redevelopment of Paradise took place.

Now they’re ready to return, it will be a key milestone for the estate to see all of its historic statues returned.

As well as Watt and Priestley, the estate is also home to Thomas Attwood, Birmingham’s first MP, who sits on the lower steps of Chamberlain Square, and who was re-sited in 2020 after being put into storage, also in 2015.

On a sunny Friday morning earlier this summer, we paid James Watt a visit at Midland Masonry in Market Drayton, and found him not just cleaned, but repaired and restored by the stonemasons and craftsmen at this highly specialised contractor.

His sheer size – more than two and a half metres in height and with correspondingly larger than life hands and limbs – made him look more like a giant than a mortal man.

Thanks to the professional team looking after him, Watt has probably never looked so good.

As well as repairing a long-standing nose injury and replacing parts of his famous steam condenser held at his side and the restoration of the folds of his coat, Watt has also been scrubbed clean and treated with a new anti-stain and anti-algae finish.

The same exercise has been completed on Joseph Priestley who has been repaired by Ian Clark Restoration in Winchester with stains and small injuries to the figure fixed and his bronze patina deepened and improved – his skin now has never had such a glow!

The stone plinths have also been cleaned and restored to their original condition, with the next stage once the plinths are in place, will be about bringing both of the Priestley and Watt statues home.

Watch this space!