Tag Archives: Lida Kindersley

‘Words Made Stone’

IMG_2272‘Words Made Stone’ records a ‘conversation’ between Lida Lopes Cardozo Kindersley MBE, one of the country’s leading letter cutters, and Marcus Waithe, lecturer in English at Magdalene College in Cambridge. The value of this style of gaining information was brought home to me when I interviewed a number of lettering luminaries for Heritage Crafts series of ‘In Conversation With …’. The one with Lida is here, and there are others worth watching on the Heritage Crafts website as well.

 

 

IMG_2274This book provides a fascinating insight into how a modern letter cutting workshop with masters, journeymen and apprentices actually works, and works very successfully indeed. This workshop format allows for exchanges of ideas, creativity, and for skills and techniques to be passed on collaboratively at the same time. Here four people at the workshop are each working on different projects.

 

 

 

IMG_2277Do view the ‘In Conversation With …’ Lida to see the actual workshop. First of all I couldn’t believe how clean and tidy it was when I was there – and was assured that it wasn’t like this especially for the filming! Tidyness and order matter when in a workshop, whether with one person or several. Time is wasted looking for items of equipment, and putting things away after use is part of good craft practice – a place for everything, and everything in its place.

 

 

 

IMG_2279More collaboration is needed when cutting letters in situ, and not all of them are ideally placed. Each letter cutter here adopts a different position from kneeling, sitting and crouching over, lying prone and lying sideways (Lida at the back – how did that work?).

 

 

 

 

IMG_2275But in addition to that, the book explores how each commission is approached, every one being different. From very first ideas, sketches sometimes being made at or soon after the initial approach, to working out those ideas with more precision, and finally, as here, Lida  completing a precise drawing to scale.

 

 

 

IMG_2276Sometimes ideas pop up at rather inopportune moments. You will need to buy and read the book to find out exactly when Lida and her assistant Fiona came up with the ideas for the fourteen stations of the cross and how coincidental and even dangerous it was! The brief was to incorporate square tiles in the designs. Note the successful nesting of letters to accommodate different lengths of text.

 

 

 

IMG_2278So is this ‘just’ a conversation about workshops and processes? Certainly, not! The book is so much more. There is so much philosophy to the way of working, thinking about each commission, and a sense of, as Lida says, learning by doing, but also perfecting by doing. As she writes ‘We get on with the job, do the best we can and in the process we learn and improve. This is not achieved by sitting in front of a drawing board or easel dreaming of the perfect capital. It is only earned by getting on with it, through craftsmanship’.

There is so much to love in this book – the fascinating and interesting text, of course, beautiful photography, the images of white pencils sharpened to point beyond belief is so intriguing, but the whole design and production is really carefully done. Such thought has been given to the selection of the images illustrating the points being made, and even to the quality and feel of the paper – perhaps regarded as trivial by some, but how wonderful to enjoy the actual touch of fingers on the pages as they are turned. This is a book for anyone and everyone – buy it, enjoy it, read, learn and dream of being able to commission your own cut lettering from this wonderful workshop.

‘The Ins and Outs of Public Lettering’

IMG_0802This delightful little book ‘The Ins and Outs of Public Lettering: Kindersley Inscriptions in the Open’ by Marcus Waithe, Lida Lopes Cardozo Kindersley and Thomas Sherwood does exactly what it says. Following their books on the workshop itself, letter cutting, sundials, apprentices, cut letters in gardens and much else, this book focuses on examples of lettering from the workshop which all can see.

Amazingly, the workshop is now in its ninth decade, with David Kindersley having started his training with Eric Gill in 1934, and, after setting up on his own in 1936 he settled in the Cambridge workshop in 1946. This is now run by his gifted letter-cutter widow Lida and there are still apprentices and journeymen learning the skills of letter-form and letter cutting in the workshop.

IMG_0811The workshop has many important and significant commissions under its belt, such as the lettering on the gates of the British Library as shown on the cover of the book, but it does not omit the more seemingly straightforward perhaps and more discrete examples of public lettering such as this memorial in a graveyard. It seems to simple yet note how the word ‘Remember’ is carefully placed on the rather narrow, rugged stone, and that to fit in the larger letters, the first ‘M’ and ‘E’ share a stroke, and the second ‘M’ and ‘B’ do too. And note the three different forms of the letter ‘E’. All add variety, catch the eye, show what good design is all about, but need inspiration, careful thought and great cutting to execute.

 

IMG_0806Perhaps more easily seen and certainly more complicated is the memorial to Francis Crick at Gonville and Caius College in Cambridge. His work on the double helix structure of DNA won him a Nobel Prize. Cut in green slate and Caithness stone, the DNA structure forms the pattern for the memorial and can be seen from outside the college from the Senate House entrance opposite St Mary’s Church.

 

 

 

 

IMG_0804Another complicated piece for the workshop was the design for the Garden Building at King’s College also in Cambridge. Twenty seven slates from the roof of the college were used – not that easy as they had little depth for cutting and the edges were friable – to mark the benefactor, and tie in the name of the building and the life of the benefactor’s late brother with flowers from English gardens of particular resonance to the family.

IMG_0805Everyone in the workshop was involved in painting the flowers on the slate tiles.

 

 

 

IMG_0808Benefactors to Cambridge colleges and Nobel Prize winning scientists are one thing, those who gave their lives saving others at sea are another, but those unsung heroes are nevertheless recorded and remembered on this slate which is now on the Old Coastguard Rescue Station at Shingle Street.

 

 

 

 

IMG_0810Almost missed perhaps on the building itself, but appreciated by anyone who walks by and notices the many ways in which extraordinary people can be remembered in stone.

This little book has so many examples and is certainly worth buying to look through and appreciate the many ways in which letter cutting can bring buildings to life and record the lives of those of note.

David Kindersley Centenary Celebrations

David Kindersley letteringI happened to be waiting in Exhibition Road to go into the Victoria and Albert Museum many years ago, and noticed the letter-cut sign on the wall. The more I looked at it, the more intrigued I was. The lettering looked so perfect and so even; it was cut over two blocks of stone, and yet no letter was actually on the join. In addition, the steady diagonal on the right-hand side almost drew in to the lettering the obvious bomb damage. It seemed a supreme example of craftsmanship. I learned later when talking with David that, when he was approached to cut the inscription noting that the damage to the building was as a result of air raids, he was asked what sort of stone he wanted to cut the lettering on for it to be attached to the building; his reply was that there was perfectly good stone already on the walls!

IMG_0015David’s lettering was exceptional, his eye for design, and particularly spacing quite phenomenal (one of his quotes was on the lines of a bad space is worse than a bad letter). This year, 2015, celebrates his centenary and there are a number of events planned. For details see the Cardozo-Kindersley workshop website here. One major event is the exhibition at the Fitzwilliam Museum; this is on from 21st April to 14th June and coincides with more of David’s work at Kettles Yard, both in Cambridge. If you haven’t been to either then both are worth a visit on their own, but take in David’s exhibitions while you’re there!

wall picHis inventiveness and skill are shown here in a picture from the wall in the Cardozo Kindersley workshop – examples of lettering of various styles and designs, and beneath that a cupboard with the tools of the trade. David learned letter cutting with Eric Gill when the latter was based at Pigotts in High Wycombe in December 1934 starting when David was 19. His father, it was said, liked to do things properly, and so he paid for David to be apprenticed. Whilst with Gill, David worked on many important commissions.

 

 

IMG_0004When Gill died in 1940, David was asked to take over the workshop, but once he had sorted out Gill’s affairs, he set up his own workshop at Dales Barn in Barton. David was a leading figure in setting up the Crafts Council and became Chair, stepping down because of concerns of underfunding (’twas ever thus!). David’s lettering for the Ministry of Transport was widely praised, but in the end they chose a lower case monoline style for motorway signs. Yet his clear and readable letters are still seen throughout Cambridge and in other towns and cities which have an eye for good design!

pod57Many commissions flowed from the workshop in Barton and when it was moved into a converted infants’ school in Cambridge itself, not least the magnificent gates for the British Library, designed by David and his third wife, Lida. They are a fitting addition to a remarkable building.

 

 

 

 

IMG_0394The workshop is currently preparing for the exhibitions and centenary events and here is a selection of David’s work being considered for inclusion. Again it shows just how versatile and talented he was.

There is not only the exhibitions but also an evening at the British Library with Tanya Harrod, Fiona MacCarthy and Lida and Hallam Kindersley on Friday 12th June (tickets here). The London exhibition is at the Patrick Bourne Gallery on 15th June, with pieces of David’s work for sale alongside new pieces by the workshop. Then the Centenary Walk is previewed here, and also a wonderful set of playing cards with David’s work featured on the backs of the cards – a delightful video shown here.

All in all a great way to celebrate the life and work of such a wonderful man, a true Alphabetician!