Coutts Bank Columns in Gibberd Garden, Harlow

Corinthian columns salvaged by Sir Frederick Gibberd from Coutts Bank in the Strand, London, during a redesign by his architectural firm and rearranged as 'The Temple'. Sir Frederick noted, 'The temptation was to place the columns as the focus of a vista in the 18th century manner, but being only 22 ft high they would have been lost against the ash trees in the background...the urns (from the parapet) are in Co[a]de stone. I mounted them on blocks from the frieze to increase the scale and give them unity. There was dismay on the Bank site when I asked for some of the columns and fragments to be sent to Harlow. Time would be lost dismantling them rather than smashing them to bits. Eventually a huge lorry equipped with a crane drove down my lane, demolished three trees and dumped a pile of huge fragments in a ditch opposite my entrance gates.. It was an expensive folly.'
Shown here during under snow and dated February 1977.