Gheluvelt Park Arch, Gates and Railings

The Gheluvelt Park Arch, gates, and railings are a memorial gateway designed and built in 1924 by Alfred Hill Parker. The archway is constructed of red brick in a Flemish bond pattern, with stone dressings and a tiled cap. The gates and screens are made of cast and wrought iron.

The gateway consists of brick piers flanking a central arch, with angled wing walls and railings to either side, and iron gates within the arch. The eastern and western faces are similar in design. The brick arch has banded rustication to the lower body of the piers, topped by a projecting band of headers at the springing of the arch. A raised band of stretchers surrounds the semi-circular arch, culminating in a triple keystone motif of bricks. The spandrels on both sides feature brick carvings of laurel wreaths in high relief. The wall tapers towards the top, culminating in a frieze of raised brickwork. Stone panels are centrally located on each side; the eastern panel reads ‘GHELUVELT PARK’. Above this is an ashlar cornice and the monument is topped by a hipped cap of pantiles.

Half piers, with panelled moulded ashlar bases and caps, abut the flanks of the arch. Finials take the form of square vases supporting stunted obelisks. Angled, wrought-iron screens project above low walls, connecting to full piers with matching dressings and caps. The two central gates feature panels of wrought iron and cast metal depicting the city’s arms, with miniature stunted-obelisk finials mirroring the stone caps on the piers. The piers are connected to later-date railings. Historic photographs show that a picket fence originally stood in this location.

Two fixed, gilded bronze panels are on the eastern side of the archway. The left panel reads ‘THIS PARK WAS OPENED / ON THE 17TH JUNE 1922 / BY / FIELD MARSHAL / THE RT. HON. THE EARL OF YPRES / PC, KP, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCMG.’ The right pier displays a panel reading 'CITY of WORCESTER HOMES / for DISABLED SAILORS and SOLDIERS / THESE HOMES WERE ERECTED / BY CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE / CITY and COUNTY of WORCESTER / THE SCHEME BEING ORIGINATED BY / ALD. ARTHUR CARLTON CBE / THE FOUNDATION STONE WAS LAID BY / FIELD MARSHAL / SIR WILLIAM ROBERTSON GCB, KCVO, DSO / ON 15TH JAN 1919 THE HOMES OPENED BY / GENERAL LORD RAWLINSON GCB, GCVO, KCMG / ON 13TH JULY 1920’.