Thinking about crafting remembrance.
Monday 20th April 2023 marked 30 years since the IRA bomb took the lives of Tim Parry, Jonathan Ball and Bronwen Vickers. It shook the community of Warrington, sparking international outrage and a renewed determination to find a peace process.
It was good to see the community still cherishing the River of Life streetscape all these years later, created as both memorial and response to the destruction of that day. I believe the street has played a small part in the healing of the town, and it was encouraging to see how the craft detail and high quality materials have endured all this time.
River of Life Case-study - read more
My feeling was that the street was not just physically broken but spiritually, and a response should come from a desire to bring hope, freshness and new life back to Bridge Street. Allowing the development to become, not a stark memorial in an unaltered landscape, but a symbol of renewal and faith in the power of the human spirit to triumph over adversity and to invest the future with hope.
Water, both in its literal and symbolic forms, is the key to the sculpture. It is the tears shed by victims of loss, but it is also a symbol of healing, of cleansing and renewal.
Stephen Broadbent
Making. The desire was to bring hope, freshness and new life to Bridge Street and the community. A streetscape concept emerged, incorporating every aspect of the urban landscape and its elements including paving, seating units and lighting columns.
News clip from 1999
Bronze details
Warrington Peace Centre
Colin and Wendy Parry were thrust into the public gaze and together with the NSPCC established a peace centre in Warrington. The Foundation for Peace and NSPCC joined forces to raise funds for the £3million Centre opened on 20th March 2000...the 7th anniversary of the IRA bomb.
Colin Parry said he and his wife Wendy had "focused so much on turning something bad into something good". They established the Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Peace Foundation which opened in March 2000, on the seventh anniversary of the boys' deaths.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-64995094
