Modern monoliths to become a Newquay 'pilgrimage'

The Newquay Monoliths are still being worked on and will create a two-mile walking and biking trail across the town

Modern bronze monoliths are to be installed around Newquay this summer.

The permanent structures will be located in three sites across the town.

The first sculpture will be ready in July, with the other two being erected shortly afterwards.

Robin Sullivan, the artist behind The Newquay Monoliths, hopes they will become "a pilgrimage" through the town.

Robin Sullivan wanted the textures of the monoliths to be "fragments of the Newquay landscape"

The monoliths will be located from Newquay's oldest known settlement, the Bronze age Barrowfields, to the most recent settlement in the new suburb of Nansledan, via the community hub at Newquay Orchard.

Robin Sullivan says the sculpures have been created for and by the community of Newquay.

It is hoped the modern monoliths will recall the ancient Neolithic stones scattered across the Cornish landscape used for millennia as places of contemplation, healing and communal gatherings.

The Newquay Monoliths have been made using more than 300 direct casts of the town chosen and made by local people of places that held personal significance to them.

The project has been overseen by Robin Sullivan, who grew up in Looe, and local community arts organisation ALMA Artspace.

It has been paid for by the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Good Growth Programme, managed by Cornwall Council, and the government's UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

Robin Sullivan wanted the textures of the monoliths to be "fragments of the Newquay landscape."

Hundreds of people from Newquay were involved in the process including youngsters and members of the town's homeless community.

"We cast bits of rock pool and bits of bench and bits of carpark" Robin said, adding "these places that maybe don't mean anything to anybody else but they have an association and meaning to that person".

'Change over the decades'

Each sculpture has been created using between 18 and 22 panels of cold-cast bronze.

The artist has made more than 50 of them, which included collages of the casts made by the public.

Robin said: "This will polish up into lovely bronze which will then patina naturally in the landscape and change over the decades."

The two tallest sculptures are around 2.5m (8ft 2in) high and the smallest is around 1.8m (5ft 9in).

The monoliths will create a two-mile walking and biking trail across Newquay and the artist has said the idea was that the stones became "a pilgrimage" through the town.

The Newquay Monoliths will be officially unveiled on 7 September 2025 at the Barrowfields.