SCAFFOLDING ART

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 687, 12 June 1929, Page 6

SCAFFOLDING ART

FEAT AT WESTMINSTER Londoners have discovered a new beauty in design at the Houses of Parliament—the scaffolding on the high tower —and during the holidays thousands of visitors as well have been gazing at it with real admiration. Hundreds of feet above the ground it begins—so high, indeed, that the labour of erecting it is another wonder, so high that the great poles look no larger than matches, but the perfection of line, the symmetrv of the whole, satisfy the eye like some classic piece of architecture. This is conscious art. The scaffold builders are heritors of an ancient craft, and the architect in charge of the works has directed them to follow as far as may be the lines of the tower itself. “We have tried to show,” he said, “that scaffolding can be made beautiful.”

Steel poles and travelling cradles may be more economical, but they can never be so beautiful as the old design of wooden poles and cross-pieces, and many builders still prefer these for aesthetic reasons.

The scaffolding at the Houses of Parliament is for the work of replacing the not-very-old stone that is rotting away, and some time soon the tower of Big Ben itself will be thus encased.