Work continues apace on the Entrepreneurs' Letters Patent.

On Friday 27th June, the Clerk visited the calligrapher and illustrator Timothy Noad - and was delighted by the progress!

     

Tim, who was awarded an MBE this year for his work designing the King's royal cipher, has spent nearly 40 years illuminating charters, emblems, and coats of arms. He is one of the College of Arms' preferred artists, and a master of his craft. The Entrepreneurs commissioned Tim to work on the Letters Patent, which will be presented to the Master by the Lord Mayor on 14th July in a special ceremony at Mansion House.

Illustrations, featuring symbols and motifs significant to the Worshipful Company of Entrepreneurs, beautify the borders of the vellum document, which features the City of London's full achievement of arms, alongside the prescribed prose detailing the process by which the Entrepreneurs were constituted a Livery Company.

Tim is using a number of special techniques - including sponging his bespoke shades of ink over specially-created silhouettes; and applying Japanese shell gold mixed with gum Arabic. The gold on the document is then painstakingly burnished with an antique curved agate polishing tool. Refilling his pen whilst experimenting with ink shades on an early draft of the lettering has led to the distinctive and very captivating use of multiple blues in the acclamation.

Tim's studio is full of heraldry and memorabilia from his many commissions. Amongst the many heraldic beasts, the Clerk was delighted to be introduced to the most majestic of them all - Tim's cat, Ginkgo!

 

The finished Letters Patent will be presented in a special ceremony at 5.30pm on Monday 14th July - you can book for that at Letters Patent Presentation

The Letters Patent will then be availble to view in the Drawing Rooms of Mansion House from 6.45pm by guests attending The Election Court Banquet 2025

 

NOTES: Letters Patent are authorisation or constitution documents intended to be patently (i.e. openly) displayed. Letters Patent are issued by the Lord Mayor and the Court of Aldermen in recogniton of the formal constitution of Livery Companies of the City of London. The formal text of this document charts the second half of the Livery journey of the Guild of Entreprenuers - listing in detail its constitution as a Company without Livery, and then the series of examinations and determinations made by the Court of Aldermen (and the Magistracy and Livery Subcomittee of the Court of Aldermen) since December of 2024.

The document is issued by the Lord Mayor - Alderman Alastair King DL - who is presently the Senior Warden of the Worshipful Company of Entrepreneurs. It also records the name of Alderman & Sheriff Greg Jones who chairs the Magistracy & Livery Subcommittee of the Court of Aldermen.

The document is hand inked on vellum parchment, and richly illustrated with the Entrepreneurs' adopted symbols and emblems.