Three Ships Mural

The mural was designed for the principal entrance at the corner of Jameson Street and Waltham Street, and overlooking a wide junction with King Edward Street, now a largely pedestrianised area in the centre of Hull. When it was installed it was believed to be the biggest mural in Britain; it rises above the ground-floor entrance through three storeys to roof level and is 66ft high by 64ft wide (20m x 19.5m). The size of the mural made it too big for the ceramic work which was Boyson’s more usual choice for his mural designs. Instead, Boyson’s design was executed as a glass tile mosaic by Richards Tiles Ltd, Stoke, which was fixed to a curved concrete screen. The mural comprises 4,224ft sq (0.3m sq) slabs, each made up of 225 glass cubes or tesserae imported from Italy; altogether there are 1,061,775 tesserae. The mosaic slabs were affixed to the screen by A Andrews and Sons (Marble and Tiles) Ltd of Leeds.

The ‘Three Ships’ mosaic mural is a stylised, modern design intended to symbolise the city’s fishing industry. It shows the silhouettes of three sailing boats reflected in the water below. Beneath the boats is a Latin motto - RES PER INDUSTRIAM PROSPERAE (roughly, 'Things by Industry Prosper'). It uses a limited palette of pale greens, blues and browns, the muted colours of the design having been requested by Hull’s town planners. A number of the individual tesserae have dropped off and there are a number of small holes with broken tesserae, which are understood to have been caused by scaffolding poles.

This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 28/11/2019