Two beautiful sundials, a polished bronze armillary sphere and a horizontal dial with a butterfly sculpture gnomon. Photos: Brad Dillon, Horniman Museum.
To a visiting speaker the PROBUS name may be unfamiliar but to the many groups of retired people who meet every month to hear a talk on yet another interesting topic the name simply means pleasure. This was certainly the case with the Comiston group in south Edinburgh who invited Alastair Hunter to speak about sundials Continue reading
Scottish sundial stone supported by pedestal in the form of a lady. Photo: Dennis Cowan
There is a sundial standing in the garden at Lennoxlove House in Scotland that begs for an explanation of its curious form. The stone statue of a beautiful lady provides the pedestal for this sundial and there is no other like it. Unwrapping layers of history about such an unusual piece of architecture started last year in October. It was many months before we really knew the secrets of why this lady was there and what was her name. Continue reading
Our bright and interesting sundial display at Damhead Nursery near Edinburgh is always at its best under sunny blue skies. This year we will have to wait a little longer for the sunshine, as the photo shows, but we are all set up again for the 2016 season. Grey skies overhead still blot out the sun but we can say that winter blues are now behind us. There was some storm damage to our display stand over the winter, which we had to repair, Continue reading
Early computer model for the sundial (left), and the completed design erected on the wall of the school building
For anyone who has ever enjoyed doing geometry at school, getting the angles right on a sundial may not sound so difficult. The sundial has to see the sun and the shadows have to tell the time. When sundial sculptor Tim Chalk was sketching out ideas for his latest work to erect a sundial at Dollar Academy, a leading Scottish school, he thought about the angles Continue reading
Orbdial is a universal type of sundial that can be set for different latitudes.
In a land renowned for its clocks and watches a Swiss couple have chosen our Orbdial sundial to mark the hours in their historic garden set on a hill above Montreux, overlooking Lac Leman, which they are restoring to former glories. The sundial has a handsome polished pedestal in pink and yellow veined marble from Verona. The couple wanted to see the colours of sunrise and sunset in the sky picked up by the sundial and the stone. In Victorian times this house welcomed figures from music and the arts, including Gertrude Jekyll the influential garden designer. Continue reading
The Dihelion sundial casts an exact shadow at equinox and solstice
Three weeks now till Christmas when time stands still for excited children opening their presents. Strangely, also on the twenty-fifth of December, clocks and sundials read the same time as each other, because the equation of time is zero. Winter solstice when the sun stands still is a few days earlier. This year it is on the twenty-second of December.
It seems a while since the sunshine was warm Continue reading
Photo: Dennis Cowan
This remarkable object is a Scottish sundial. Its intricate geometry and beautiful craftsmanship are like many of the stone sundials found in Scotland. They were one of the features of grand houses in the 17th century. But this one seems as if it is holding secrets, it is not quite like the others, it is a curious object and perhaps it holds its own story? Continue reading
After a time the sun did shine when we were setting up our new Dihelion sundial sculpture at the Savill Garden, Surrey. The sun was out just long enough to align the sundial before we left. Dihelion is now fully installed and ready to view as part of the Savill Garden’s annual sculpture exhibition ‘Sculpture in the Garden’ Continue reading
In a break with previous sundials an original new design has been created that has two shadows, one showing the time of day and another the season of the year. This adds more pleasure to having a sundial in a garden. The design has been named DIHELION meaning ‘dual sun’ after the ancient Greek words. The sundial will be launched to the public on 1 September at ‘Sculpture in the Garden’, the annual sculpture exhibition at The Savill Garden, Windsor, Berkshire.
It is thought the concept of DIHELION having two shadows Continue reading
The weather forecast for Edinburgh was cloudy and it seemed too much to hope for—would we be able to see the solar eclipse in our garden on Friday morning? Was it possible that on 20 March 2015, the very day that an eclipse would coincide with the equinox, Continue reading