We Make An Offer For The Bell Foundry

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The foundry, shuttered and graffitied since 2017

After campaigning for six years, I am delighted to announce that this week The London Bell Foundry made an offer to acquire the former Whitechapel Bell Foundry at market value. The London Bell Foundry is a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee, set up with the purpose of operating a bell foundry in Whitechapel, combining traditional bell founding with the use of digital technology.

Although the hotel scheme is now dead, the judgement of the Secretary of State’s Public Inquiry into the future of the foundry in 2020 obligates the owner to ensure foundry activity continues at this site.

We seek to acquire the Grade II* listed buildings as a permanent home for the London Bell Foundry.

We want to open it as a fully-working foundry, re-establishing the world’s most famous bell foundry that operated in Whitechapel for five hundred years from the reign of Elizabeth I to the reign of Elizabeth II.

Our mission is to reinvigorate the art and science of bell founding through a marriage of new and old technology, casting church bells, artists’ bell, ceremonial bells, and bells for all occasions.

We are working with Nigel Taylor, foreman at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry for forty years, alongside artists of international stature and a team of the foremost experts in the technology of casting.

We plan to maximise the educational potential, through apprenticeships for local people and work with schools and colleges in East London.

Our first commission was the Covid Bell in 2021, designed by Grayson Perry in support of our mission, which debuted at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022. The Covid Bell will tour NHS hospitals, enabling those have been bereaved to toll the bell in remembrance.

The Elizabeth Bell is a forthcoming commission to commemorate seventy years since the coronation of Elizabeth II.

The London Bell Foundry has demonstrated a proven financial model that can ensure the tradition of bell founding continues in this country in perpetuity.

SUPPORTERS

“I fully support the proposal by the London Bell Foundry to establish a working foundry at the historic Whitechapel site. It is tragic that the bell foundry has been shuttered up since 2017. The presence of a rejuvenated modern bell foundry will once again assert Whitechapel as a place of creative innovation and restore the international reputation of the place where Big Ben and the Liberty Bell were made.”

Lutfur Rahman, Mayor of Tower Hamlets

“The Whitechapel Bell Foundry is one of the East End’s most treasured institutions, with a history stretching back to the 16th century. The foundry made Big Ben, America’s Liberty Bell and more locally the Bow Bells. So many people in the community are campaigning to save as much of the original building as possible, and to keep it as a working foundry. I am proud to support the Save the Whitechapel Bell Foundry campaign, and encourage everyone to join in. Together we can save this important feature of East End life.”

Rushanara Ali, MP for Bethnal Green & Bow

“The East London Mosque & London Muslim Centre welcomes the proposal from the London Bell Foundry to reestablish a working foundry in Whitechapel. This will provide apprenticeships and work experience in traditional and digital crafts for the local community.”

Sufia Alam, East London Mosque & London Muslim Centre

“The re-established Whitechapel Bell Foundry would add significantly to the creative offer in East London. As the V&A East establishes a substantial presence at Stratford and the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and develops particular links with the adjacent boroughs, we would welcome the opportunity to promote the Whitechapel-based art and bell foundry. Combining traditional skills with innovative technology and the offer of apprenticeship and further training in this specialised field will enhance the interpretation of the V&A’s important collection of works of art in bronze. Continuing the centuries-old tradition of bell founding in London with its global outreach will enrich the cultural presence and attract national, regional and international interest.”

Dr Tristram Hunt, Director of Victoria & Albert Museum

“The Whitechapel Bell Foundry is a crucial component of historic Whitechapel. That it has survived for so long on this site, and in such fascinating and evocative buildings, is nothing short of a miracle. Its survival as a working site is vital both for future generations and for Whitechapel.”

Heloise Palin, Spitalfields Historic Buildings Preservation Trust

Learn more at our new THE LONDON BELL FOUNDRY website

Charles Saumarez Smith & Dickon Love will be talking about The London Bell Foundry & London Bells at the Salon for London at the Horse Hospital in Bloomsbury on Thursday 24th November. Click here for tickets

Grayson Perry’s Covid Bell at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022 (Photograph © David Parry/Royal Academy of Arts)