Bolton Wanderers Reveal First of the Nat Lofthouse Friezes

Now, if you've been keeping up with the club's efforts to commemorate Bolton's biggest legend, Nat Lofthouse, you already know that there are quite a few elements. There will be a Nat Lofthouse memorial garden, situated at the front of the stadium in the south-west corner. The garden will house a larger then life statue, based of a picture of Nat leading the boys out at Burnden Park, as chosen by the family. It will also be home to two bronze reliefs, based off other iconic images of the Lion of Vienna. Last night, the first one was revealed:

The first of two bronze friezes that is to form part of the Nat Lofthouse Memorial was revealed at an event tonight. twitter.com/OfficialBWFC/s…

— Official BWFC (@OfficialBWFC) September 27, 2012

The image, created by sculptor Sean Hedges-Quinn, who will also be doing the statue (for more about Hedges-Quinn and the creative process for the statue, see this post), is of Nat lifting the FA Cup after winning in in 1958, surrounded by his teammates. That remains, to this day, one of the finest moments in Bolton Wanderers history. The work took Hedges-Quinn around 3 months to complete. While we know the statue will be revealed on the 27th of August 2013, what would've been Lofthouse's 88th birthday, there is no known due date for the second bronze relief.

Owen Coyle said of the occasion,

We all know how important Nat was to Bolton Wanderers . He epitomised everything about the club. He was a household name. As much as he was a big star he was a humble man and you always found him with a smile.

The unveiling was open to the public, and was attended by chairman Phil Gartside, manager Owen Coyle, players Benik Afobe and Mark Davies, former players, and of course the artist Heges-Quinn. You can find our more about the Nat Lofthouse Memorial Fund by reading our earlier posts on the matter (spoiler: there is beer involved).