Twining Models of

Northampton Northampton () is a market town and civil parish in the East Midlands of England, on the River Nene, north-west of London and south-east of Birmingham. The county town of Northamptonshire, Northampton is one of the largest towns in England; ...

, England, was founded in 1920 by

Ernest W. Twining Ernest W. Twining (March 29, 1875 - September 10, 1956) was a modelmaker, artist, and engineer. Biography Ernest Twining was born in Bristol, England, and was trained as a telephone engineer. He also took art lessons at night school. After workin ...

. The firm had its origins in work Twining was doing as a sub-contractor to

Bassett-Lowke Bassett-Lowke was an English toy manufacturing company based in Northampton. Founded by Wenman Joseph Bassett-Lowke in 1898 or 1899, the company specialized in model railways, boats and ships, and construction sets. Bassett-Lowke started as ...

's. It undertook, mostly for Bassett-Lowke's, (though never a formal part of that company), the manufacture of high quality glass-case models, which were often marketed under Bassett-Lowke's name. Twining sold out in 1940, and the firm was run until 1967 as Twining Models (E. H. Clifton) Ltd.. E. H. Clifton had been a director of Twining Models, having started working for Twining as a school-leaver before Twining Models was first established. Throughout its forty-seven-year history, Twining Models established a reputation as one of the foremost British model makers. It specialised in architectural, industrial, and transport models. Before WW2 it made a number of models for the

Queen Mary's Dolls' House Queen Mary's Dolls' House is a dollhouse built in the early 1920s, completed in 1924, for Queen Mary, the wife of King George V. It was designed by architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, with contributions from many notable artists and craftsmen of the ...

, designed by

Sir Edwin Lutyens Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens ( ; 29 March 1869 – 1 January 1944) was an English architect known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era. He designed many English country houses, war memoria ...

and now at

Windsor Castle Windsor Castle is a royal residence at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire. It is strongly associated with the English and succeeding British royal family, and embodies almost a millennium of architectural history. The original c ...

, stained-glass work (on which Twining was an expert) and astronomical telescopes. After WW2 the firm made a number of planning models used in the re-development of bomb-damaged cities, also various kinds of power stations and industrial developments. The firm was never large, usually employing only a handful of craftsmen. In all some 400 models were made by the firm during its existence.

References

* Chapter 5 of Buck, Stan, ''E. W. Twining, Modelmaker, Artist & Engineer'', Landmark Publishing, 2004 () Toy companies of the United Kingdom Manufacturing companies based in Northampton Design companies established in 1920 1920 establishments in England Business services companies established in 1920 {{UK-company-stub