10 Royal Parks "Sledge" benches heading to St James' Park London

Posted on March 22, 2023

Photo Credit: Colin

St James's Park is a massive 57 acre park located in the city of Westminster in London. It is part of the Royal Parks collection of parks and borders Buckingham Palace to the west. The park dates back to Henry VIII although only really came into being during James I reign in the early 1600's when he ordered that the marshland be drained and landscaped. The park boasts a fabulous lake which is home to a pelican colony and is a very popular and indeed busy park with thousands of tourists and local residents using it daily throughout the year.

Photo credit: Pointillist - Sledge benches in the distance in St James' Park with Buckingham Palace in the background.

The hundreds of famous and unique Sledge benches that adorn the landscape of St James' park have been a recurring fixture for many years. Many benches are purchased through Royal Parks London by private customers as memorial benches complete with their own personal inscriptions and tributes to loved ones and family members. Some benches are now over 50 years old and are showing their age and so the park has an active program to replace the ones that fall into disrepair.

The Sledge bench is named as such because of the unique sledge type base at the bottom of the legs which offers a strong base to secure the bench into the ground.

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Royal Parks London

Royal Parks London have been a client of Woodcraft UK's for a few years now and we are always very proud to supply exclusively the Sledge benches specific to their own design.

We are really happy with our latest batch of 10 Sledge benches ready for installation in St James' Park. These are the 1.80 metres in length going out this week.

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These benches differ from our previous benches that we supplied as the back rest houses upright slats with a slight curvature similar to our Scarborough benches where as our previous order the back rest presented horizontal slats. The same sledge base is still present and carries the rather regal front legs that is more akin to the existing sledge benches already in existence at St James' park.

Picture above: Part of our previous order to Royal Parks London.

These benches are very heavy duty as you would expect for such a location. The extra bold curved arms and sturdy legs make for a very strong and secure wooden bench that will brave the elements and constant use by visitors to the park for many years to come.

These ten benches form part of a larger order where we will also be manufacturing and delivering a further seven 1.20 metre Sledges benches as well as five special back to back benches which are completely bespoke to us – so pictures later when we have made them.

We are really proud of our growing presence of benches in London so next time you are down there look out for our steel badges on the side of the bench because chances are you will be sitting on one of our benches.