Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk

Still busy

The beehive has been a powerful symbol for centuries. For some it has represented ‘the winged republic’, where society runs in an equitable way, with each individual playing their role to general benefit of the whole. For others, it has stood for industry and productivity. Perhaps the latter train of thought was behind the adoption of the beehive as the symbol of Lloyd’s Bank in 1822. It was the bank’s sole symbol until they took over Barnett ’s Bank in 1884, when the company also began to use Barnett’s emblem: the black horse. Both symbols were used by the bank until the 1930s, when the hive was phased out and the black horse remained.

But the occasional Lloyd’s beehive survives, like this one on a hanging sign in Bury St Edmunds. Since sign and bracket alike have clearly been carefully designed and made with some skill, it’s understandable that no one wanted to throw it away. The sign has a dome shape at the top to accommodate the hive, which is itself cut out from the background and coloured the same gold as the lettering. The bracket is shaped to follow the contours of the hive, adorned with curlicues and finials, and braced with a diagonal strut; it’s fancy, but not distracting because the clear lettering and symbol make the sign very easy to read: I’d say the combination works very well. No doubt that fact that the building it’s attached to is still branch of Lloyd’s means it’s still effective too, alerting anyone who doesn’t know to the bank’s location as they approach along the pavement. It was, I’d say, a good investment.

Loughborough, Leicestershire

The exemplary bee

I've noted before how bees have been used as symbols of co-operation for hundreds of years, and as symbols of the Co-operative Movement since its first inception in the 19th century. This plaque, which I came across on a building in Loughborough, no doubt marks the site of Co-op store. The motto it bears, 'Unity is strength', was also adopted early on by the Co-operative Pioneers, although they sometimes used the form 'Union is strength'.

Although this plaque is not quite as beautifully made as the one I spotted in Wiltshire a while back, it scores highly in one key respect. While the Wiltshire example showed just the hive, this one includes actual bees in flight. These long-enduring creatures, here, so the fancy lettering proclaims, since 1865, remain to remind us of their links with industry, cooperation, sweetness, and continuing pollination and life. Whether represented artistically, as in this Loughborough street, or in their living form, they deserve our notice and respect.

Corsham, Wiltshire

Being busy together

Bees and their hives have been powerful symbols for thousands of years – probably ever since human beings first observed communities of bees working together and first tasted the honey they produced. As well as standing for sweetness (think of the madrigal "Sweet honey-sucking bees" by John Wilbye and "the bag of the bee", icon of sweetness in "Her Triumph", Ben Jonson's most mellifluous lyric) they're also symbolic of industry, especially industry that involves working together. And that's why bees and hives have been powerfully symbolic of the Co-operative movement ever since it was founded in the 19th century.

So I wasn't surprised to find out that this plaque showing an old-fashioned bee skep, high above a shop window in Corsham, was put there by the local Co-op when they built their shop here in 1906. Whoever carved the plaque thoughtfully included some flowers for the bees too. A century on, there's still a Co-op in Corsham, but on a different site. However the concern for bees continues with   "Plan Bee", the Co-op's campaign to support much-needed pollinators in our gardens, market gardens, and fields. From this Arts and Crafts influenced plaque to Plan Bee, advertised on my pot of breakfast honey, the link between natural and commercial cooperation is still vital.

Bee shelter, Hartpury, Gloucestershire

Almost too small to be a building, this structure is simply too special to ignore. It is a shelter containing 33 niches or boles to accommodate straw bee skeps, the traditional English forerunners of bee hives. There is nothing else like it in the world.

The shelter was originally made in the Gloucestershire town of Nailsworth by a stone mason, Paul Tuffley, some time between 1824 and 1852. Its carved scrollwork decoration shows that Tuffley was an accomplished carver and from the beginning the structure must have looked impressive. By the 1960s, though, it was unused – the bee skep had long been replaced by the wooden hive and the shelter looked likely to be demolished. But it was rescued and resited at Hartpury Agricultural College – only to be moved once more to Hartpury churchyard in 2002, when it was thoroughly restored. It’s still there, showing how well housed some of Gloucestershire’s bees once were.