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Written by Stephanie Hunt • Photographs by Peter Frank Edwards
the
project
More than 600 assemblages of wrought
iron—his life’s work—exist in Charleston
and beyond. Now, the hunt is on to locate
and document each piece and preserve the
handcrafted legacy of a beloved man
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Precision & Grace:
“Mr. Simmons may have only had
a few years of school, but he’s a
mathematical genius,” says filmmaker
Steve Lepre. This driveway gate
(opposite) on upper Rutledge
Avenue bears graceful curves in
perfect symmetry.
Gateway to Memory:
“Mr. Simmons is a visual artist,” says
Mary Edna Fraser (top, second from
left, pictured with Sunhead Projects’
Steve Lepre, far left, and Mark
McKinney, right). “Going by and seeing
the gates sparks his memory. Then he
remembers the next one he did, the story
behind it, and so on.” This “harp” gate
(above) just off Calhoun Street is topped
with Simmons’ signature “wiggle.”
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It’s a cool, clear fall day, with sunlight pouring in like someone took the lid off the
world. A perfect day for a drive. A minivan
slowly winds through peninsula neighborhoods, pausing in front of homes and
driveways, its passengers checking out
architectural details and noting the lovely
ironwork. But this isn’t your typical
Charleston tourist drive-by. This is curatorial cruising. Historical field research.This is
four artists and a movie camera, and one
big undertaking. Welcome to the Philip
Simmons Documentation Project.
“Here, take a left. Yep, turn…here—I
know it’s here somewhere,” Mr. Simmons
says from the back seat. And sure enough,
the van rounds a corner north of Spring
Street, and there’s a magnificent iron gate.
This one has brass knobs on it, a departure
for the purist blacksmith. “I don’t usually
work in brass,” says Simmons,“But this lady
insisted, and you know, the customer is
always right.” Every year or so she’d call
him to come over and polish the brass,
Simmons explains. And so the living history unfolds, one left turn, one gate, one
telling anecdote at a time.
You’d be hard-pressed to find a
Charlestonian more beloved than Simmons.
He’s the darling of preservationists, the epitome of artistry, the king of craftsmanship,
and the hallmark of humility. And besides
all that, he’s just plain endearing. Philip
Simmons emanates warmth and wisdom as
if he soaked it up by the hot forge all these
94 years and the coals are still glowing.
Forget Tuesdays with Morrie, just a short
time in Simmons’ presence makes the
essentials of a good and meaningful life
apparent: hard work, faith, integrity, gratitude. He’s earned more accolades than will
fit under his anvil, and just when you think
he’s received about every recognition possible (Order of the Palmetto, National
Heritage Fellowship Award, an honorary
doctorate from South Carolina State
University, The Elizabeth O’Neill Verner
Award, to name a few), Wheel of Fortune
comes along and wants their upcoming
Charleston show to feature Vanna White in
front of a Philip Simmons’ gate. Fitting, perhaps, for someone who started out making
wagon wheels.
Yet while Simmons is much celebrated
and much adored, his oeuvre is not welldocumented, at least not thoroughly. Four
books, including two children’s books, and
a 20-minute video tell his story, but to date,
there isn’t a complete catalogue of his
work. When Simmons began crafting ornamental ironwork in 1938, he did so out of
necessity, never anticipating notoriety. He
made meticulous sketches, some of which
still exist, and in later years, as his gates
“Our ultimate goal is to archive every piece of Philip
Simmons’ ironwork that we can get our hands on.”
—Mark McKinney, Sunhead Projects
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(above) Morris Street
Simmons gave care to every detail,
including the hinges and hardware.
(opposite) King Street
Charleston merchant Jack Krawcheck
brought his blacksmith friend some scrap
metal and a sketch based on a 1700s
design and asked Simmons to make him
a gate. It was Simmons’ first commission
and marked his transition from craftsman to artisan. The swan and tulip
motifs reflect Simmons’ love of incorporating “God’s creation” into his designs.
J I M
B R U E C K N E R
(right) Behind King Street
Another gate in the Krawcheck collection, which includes some 30 pieces
ranging from formal gates to lantern
holders, all in one location.
Roll Film: Award-winning filmmakers
Lepre and McKinney edit some of the
48 hours of footage for the forthcoming
interactive DVD.
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drew more and more acclaim, he began
keeping a scrapbook, but it was loaned out
years ago and never returned. Nearly eight
decades of work—everything from gates
to window grills, railings to hinges—is scattered about, mostly concentrated in
Charleston. Some pieces, however, have
made their way across the country, as
homeowners have taken them when
they’ve moved. Some have been sold on
eBay. And the Philip Simmons Foundation,
together with Sunhead Projects, is hot on
their trail.
Collaborative Forces
The Philip Simmons Foundation is the primary “keeper of the gates.” Established in
1991 to create a commemorative garden
at St. John’s Reformed Episcopal Church,
where Simmons has been a lifelong member, the foundation now works to preserve Simmons’ legacy. As project adminis-
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The Master’s Hands: At 94, Simmons
seldom hammers on his anvil, but he
still pokes around the shop, where his
nephew, Carlton, now carries on his
legacy, fashioning the famous tight scrolls
(right) that distinguish
Simmons’ ironwork.
(opposite) Perfection for All: Window
grills featuring a leaf motif adorn a
real estate office at 56 Morris Street.
“He gave every customer his best
work, whether for an elaborate
home or run-of-the-mill commercial
building,” says McKinney.
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trator for the foundation, Rossie Colter
has developed numerous fundraising
opportunities, including a popular “Keeper
of the Gate” series, which includes a
video, a poster with 20 black-and-white
photographs of well-known pieces, and a
catalogue from a traveling exhibit of the
same name. “The catalogue features 35
images, but that’s only 35 out of potentially
600 pieces,” says Colter.
Initial efforts to document Simmons’
work began around 1995, when the
Philip Simmons Foundation and Historic
Charleston Foundation received a South
Carolina Humanities Foundation grant to
fund the research. From 1995 to 1998,
Christine Castaneda located and photographed as much of Simmons’ ironwork
as possible. “That gave us five volumes of
raw information, but we knew we had to
go back and do more,” explains Colter.“An
address would be notated as ‘window
grills,’ but it turns out there would be 14
window grills.”
The enormity of the project was overwhelming, and it sat on the back burner
while other endeavors, such as rewiring
Simmons’ aging home on Blake Street, creating the Simmons Park at Daniel Island, and
planning the Foundation’s special events,
kept Colter busy. Yet when Simmons’ longtime friend and artistic collaborator Mary
Edna Fraser introduced Colter to local filmmakers Steve Lepre and Mark McKinney, the
fire once again was stoked.
Fraser and Simmons began working
together in 1989, when both were commissioned to create installations at the
Charleston airport. “We understand each
other. We both work in tedious art forms
that require intense craftsmanship,” says
Fraser, a batik artist who also assisted
Simmons on the design for the city gates at
the Visitor Center and considers him one
of her dearest friends. Fraser has also collaborated with Lepre and McKinney on
various film projects, and she encouraged
them when they expressed an interest in
doing a piece on Simmons.
“They have an artistic passion equal to
Mr. Simmons’. I knew that they could really
capture his essence on film,” Fraser says.
After Lepre and McKinney showed Colter
their award-winning documentary on
homelessness, Who Among Us, she, too,
was sold. Colter then shared the thick
files of raw, disorganized notes documenting Simmons’ work to date—when
Lepre and McKinney got excited rather
than overwhelmed, “that’s when we got
married,” Colter laughs. They’ve been
working together for the last two years,
developing the initial film proposal into a
“History will speak for itself. This ironwork will be
here, and maybe my name will still be around, just
like some of the other artists and craftsmen.”
—Philip Simmons
philip simmons FEATURE .qxp:new orleans FEATURE
Lights, Camera, Action: The camera rolls
as Simmons holds court on his front
porch, sharing memories of his long
and illustrious career.
Back to the Drawing Board: The only
piece of his work ever to be rejected by
a customer now rests forlornly against
one of the first trailers Simmons made
after automobiles replaced the horseand-buggy.
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Every Last Hinge
Untitled: Simmons never named his
gates, letting the designs speak for
themselves. “Whatever the customer
sees is what it is,” he says.
“Our ultimate goal is to archive every piece
of Philip Simmons’ ironwork we can get
our hands on,” says McKinney. “Everything
from the famous City Gates to the fireplace
poker my former fifth grade teacher told
me about when she flagged me down one
day in Lowe’s.” Interns from the American
College of the Building Arts are in the
process of going down the existing list,
confirming, recounting, and photographing each piece, while McKinney, Lepre,
Fraser, and Simmons are doing their own
four-wheeled fieldwork.
“We pile in Mary Edna’s van, turn the
camera on Mr. Simmons, and start driving.
It’s a mobile media studio, and Mr.
Simmons loves it,” Lepre says. “Mary Edna
will prompt him with questions, so he’s
telling the story of his life and his transformation from blacksmith to artisan as we
go. We’ll find a house where he did work,
which then triggers his memory of the
next job he did around the corner.The first
day we went out, we discovered that six
gates were gone, but we found 20 more
pieces that weren’t on the list.”
Much of their reconnaissance effort is
focused on the “hidden gems,” the lesser-
known gates and window grills that
Simmons made for modest homes north of
the Crosstown. On Ashton Street, for example, they found a cinder-block home that
had a balcony railing, a fence with a gate,
and a driveway gate, all by Simmons. “I
drive by and see them still standing, and it
makes me feel good,” says Simmons.“I took
a lot of pride in doing them all. I’m extra
particular and careful when I’m doing ironwork, and I’m happy with all of them,
don’t make no difference if it’s on the
Battery or for people with not so much
money. As long as the customer was satisfied, then I’m feeling very satisfied.”
There’s urgency to this endeavor.“We’re
lucky that Mr. Simmons has lived such a
long life and that he’s still sharp as a tack
and can remember things,” says Fraser, but
he’s not going to be around forever. And
given the brisk pace of urban revitalization on the upper peninsula, neither will
all his ironwork. Some pieces have been
stolen from properties, while other homes
featuring his work are in disrepair and at
risk of demolition as new construction
encroaches. The plan is to certify pieces
much more comprehensive multimedia
documentation project.
(top) Wentworth Street
(above) Morris Street
(top) Simmons Street
(above) Wentworth Street
(top) Upper Rutledge Avenue
(above) Radcliffe Street
Many of Simmons’ hidden gems are tucked
away in less-traveled neighborhoods, far off
the usual tourist paths.
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pieces are. I think when we’re done, it’ll
spell something in code,” he jokes. The
DVD, featuring an hour-long documentary
and a “behind-the-scenes educational video
on the artistic process of making a gate,
will also include an interactive map, so
viewers can click on a Charleston neighborhood to see individual photographs and
hear Simmons talk about particular gates.
Walking tours with guided audio narration
(with comments by Simmons) and detailed
maps will be available at the Visitor Center,
Avery Research Center, and other locations
and downloadable in MP3 format from the
Philip Simmons Foundation website. For
those who prefer old-fashioned printed
materials, Sunhead Projects is designing an
art-style coffee-table book that includes a
comprehensive “Yearbook” index, with
thumbnail documentation of all the ironwork not featured in the main pages.
The Philip Simmons Foundation and
Sunhead Projects are in the process of
securing the $350,000 they estimate is
needed to complete the multifaceted project, now already two years in the works
(plans also include augmenting existing
school curricula and creating scavenger
hunts). Fraser, for one, is confident they
will succeed. “It’s such a good project,
someone will fund it,” she says. “I see this
In His Element: Simmons often welcomes
school children, scout troops, and tour
groups into his Blake Street workshop to
see his tools, such as a turn-of-the-century
anvil, (right). “I love when children ask
questions,” he says.“They want to know
do I like my work, how much money do I
make, or ‘Mr. Simmons, are you proud of
your work?’ That question really rings a
bell with me.”
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with a “PS” stamp and perhaps, McKinney
dreams, even tag them with a GPS monitor
to be able to track them.
The Unlikely Celebrity
“What’s fascinating about this project is
that it’s so technologically advanced,”
McKinney says. “We’re using Google Earth
to place electronic markers on locations of
Mr. Simmons work, so we can ‘fly’ around
Charleston and see where the 600-some
Pointing the Way: Close friends Fraser and
Simmons in the scrapyard behind his
shop, where he has gathered found
pieces into his own ironwork collection,
including some more than 200 years old.
as a gift to my friend [Simmons] and a gift
to the community. It’s a necessity; it has to
be done.”
Kitty Robinson, executive director of
Historic Charleston Foundation, agrees.
“Documenting Mr. Simmons’ legacy highlights the importance of his craftsmanship
that is so masterfully and elegantly represented throughout the city,” Robinson says.
“He has given us a continuum of excellence and wonderfully placed reminders,
from the stateliest properties to the humblest abodes, that Charleston is grounded
in the magnificent work of so many artisans. Looking at a Simmons gate, one
appreciates much more than wrought
iron, but also the history wrought in this
place. One can only imagine the strength
of those hands and the brilliant mind able
to create this beautiful work.”
As for the ever-humble Simmons, his
approach to being a movie star and to the
documentation project is much more
understated. He’s simply having a good
time. “I enjoy everything,” he says. “I enjoy
going around and looking at it, talking
about it, and trying to answer a lot of questions about it. There are very few I forgot
about. I remember most of them when I
see them, by the looks of them.
“History will speak for itself,” he adds.
“This ironwork will be here, and maybe
my name will still be around, just like some
of the other artists and craftsmen.”
Yes, Mr. Simmons, it will.
Far & Wide: According to Simmons, this
driveway gate on Wentworth Street is the
tallest and widest he ever made. The
main panels shown here are flanked by
side pieces (see details on page 147) and
illustrate his exquisite talent for balance
and understated flourish.
Want to Help?
On November 29, a fundraiser for the Philip
Simmons Project will be held at the Center for
Photography from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Meet Mr.
Simmons, view a 10-minute segment of the
documentary, and purchase signed, limitededition photographic portraits of Simmons by
Jack Alterman, with all proceeds going towards
the completion of the project.
Watch the project come to life on Charleston Magazine TV at www.charlestonmag.com.
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