Production lines and football sides – it’s all team work

This week, our Extra Time team at Leiston Primary School was joined by sculptor Ellie Rodwell.

Football, just like the manufacturing process at Garretts Engineering Works, is all about team work. With that in mind, Ellie was keen to get her own production line going.

With the children seated in rows, Ellie shared a photograph of a precisely machined piece produced at the Works with the ‘design team’, i.e. the first child in the line.

This was done in whispers, so that no-one else could hear what was said, or see the photograph.

That child described what they’d seen to the ‘drawing office’, who in turn passed it to the ‘fabrication’ worker and on to the ‘finisher’.

In each case, and without anyone on the production line having seen the initial photograph, they produced models uncannily like the originals.

Next, the children studied the Garretts Sporting Shield. The wooden shield is beautifully decorated with a large silver disc in the centre, depicting a football match, surrounded by smaller discs celebrating the winning department each year.

Using old photographs of the football teams, the children chose a player to recreate on a clay disc. With details such as cloth caps, moustaches and even heavily crossed arms, added, the discs will be left to dry until next week, when the session moves back to the Long Shop and Ellie resumes her production line at the Works.