Such a gorgeous, detailed, and artistic door and knocker! This lion’s head knocker is on the door of Cologne Cathedral, in Koln in Germany. It is far from the cathedral’s only feature though – the whole building has a history spanning the hundreds of years it took to build it, its ravages in several wars, and the illustrious contributors to the cathedral’s architecture.

There are plenty of lions head knockers in our range, but this one stands out for its size, firstly. It is among the three largest cathedrals in the world, it has a bell which weighs 3.8 tonnes, and quires engineered to be as large as possible while barely avoiding collapse … so you won’t be knocking the knocker with your thumb and forefinger! Unfortunately, you probably won’t get a chance to knock it at all, since it is on a door which is nearly always open. You may have to make an excuse for an urgent visit at 3 o’clock in the morning, just so you have an excuse! And given its size, you could hardly just give it a surreptitious little test on your way in, walking through the door. The boom would probably call priests out of their private chambers!

It looks as if the knocker, at least, is made of polished brass or bronze – given the colour that the wear on the lion’s nose and on the handle are. Brass would have been a common and obtainable metal since the current cathedral started being built in 1248. It is doubtful whether the entire door would be made of brass… it would likely be made of a stronger metal, with the brass coloured to match. The detail on the door is amazing nonetheless. Remember that modern tools and techniques for metalworking make things relatively easy and achievable, however, the door was not made in modern times! (more…)

Here at Architectural Classics we often have gorgeous, very old antique door hardware … and the newer ones fall by the wayside a little. But we couldn’t go past these gorgeous frog door knobs! They are made with a light silver resin to look like alloy, and the backplates are created with both brass and bakelite rings for strength and endurance.

Unfortunately, the only thing we can’t guarantee about them is that by kissing them, you will turn them into princes! Gosh knows what you would even do with two princes … they might end up fighting over you and slaying each other, and then you would be without either door knobs or princes. Probably safest to keep your lips well away from these, no matter how much you like to kiss your other antique door knob purchases!