A commemorative manhole cover dedicated to the LGBTQ+ community has been created as part of a partnership between Wrekin Products and Thames Water.
The cover has been designed to symbolise and immortalise the organisations’ allegiance to the community and their commitment to increasing diversity on the streets of the UK.
To bring the cover to fruition, we completed a unique manufacturing process to provide the water services company with four brand-new Unite D400 manhole covers, all sporting the bespoke design.
A unique milling and colouring process was followed so that icons, logos and the iconic rainbow colours – including black and brown to represent LGBTQ+ people from the BAME community – can be showcased on the exterior of each ductile iron cover, ensuring pedestrians will not fail to miss the one-of-a-kind design.
The design was machined into a blank cover utilising a precision CNC machine with a 1mm carbide cutter spinning at 26,000rpm and removing 5 microns of material at any one time to achieve the fine detail around the symbols. The rainbow colours were then cast using a pigmented epoxy resin, and the symbols and rain drops were polished by hand with the use of an air sander.
The location of the first cover - which was installed on Napier Road junction with Kings Meadow Road in Reading on 02 September in the days leading up to Love Unites Parade Festival, Reading’s annual Pride celebration - is particularly significant, as the pavement that runs alongside the road is part of the route that festival goers walked at this year’s event on 4 September.
Simon Turner, commercial director at Wrekin – a leading UK designer, manufacturer and supplier of specialist civil engineering products – said he was extremely pleased to see the first cover take pride of place.
He added: “We’re committed to working with partners, such as Thames Water, who are equally driven to promoting diversity and ensuring inclusivity within the workplace and wider society. These covers are the only of their kind in the world and we’re proud to have been part of the team that has brought them to the streets of the UK.
“We’re thrilled with the finished product and hope that the message ‘Every rainbow needs a little water to shine’ will be able to empower, inspire or even simply put a smile on the face of those who pass them - as each cover is being installed in an area that’s synonymous with the LGBTQ+ community. There’s so much intricate detail and creativity that’s gone into this industrial design and we look forward to people being able to enjoy the covers for generations to come.”
