April 2009, the 12 bells of Great Saint Mary’s Church in Cambridge are removed from the tower and transported to the Taylors, Eayre and Smith bell foundry in Loughborough. This is one of just two bell foundries in the UK and the largest working bell foundry in the world, dating back to the 14th century.



2009 marked the 800th Anniversary of the University of Cambridge and in celebration of this the bells of the University church were being replaced by a new peal, the generous donation of British businessman, philanthropist and bellringer, Dr Dill Faulkes. The original ones, which include those on which the ‘Cambridge Chimes’ were written, known throughout the world as the chimes of Big Ben, had been repaired many times in the past but had become worn out.



In May I was commissioned by the University to take this opportunity to photograph in detail the inscriptions of all the old bells. Some were to be sold to other churches, others returned to the church tower to ‘hang dead’.



Over the next two months I made four visits to the bell foundry, and each time I explored further into the mysteries of this extraordinary place. With the help of Steve Fletcher, the bell tuner, I gained access to every nook and cranny of the old buildings.



The photographs in this book are a record of this exploration, personal photographs taken after the more technical recording was complete. They show the various stages involved in the making of the bells and the people whose expertise and experience make this all possible. The story starts with the building up of the ‘core’ to create the inner profile of the bell. At the same time the ‘case’ is worked on to create its outer profile. The case and the core are then brought together to form a completed mould which is buried in sand, and molten metal is poured in to fill the space between the two. After some days the mould is dug up and the mould is opened up to reveal the new bell.



A theme running through the book is the story of the new tenor, from its initial mould to its delivery to the tower in Cambridge.



But the main story is one of an industry hardly changed in hundreds of years. Many of the people featuring in this book lost their jobs when the foundry briefly went into administration in September 2009, and while the foundry itself was saved the highly specialized jobs in many cases were not. And it is to Steve Fletcher, without whose help and wisdom I could not have done this project, that I dedicate this book.