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...

Wow – such an awesome door knocker that if you had the chance to put it on your door, you probably wouldn’t even mind that it is a bit chipped. This is what cast bronze can look like as it ages, when it is left un-lacquered – you get some gorgeous contrasts between the protruding metal, which is polished by time and people’s hands, and the receding metal, which collects a layer of time and darkens. Archaeologists believe that this door knocker was made in southern Italy around 1100. Given that there is a lettered inscription in Arabic around the edge, it is interesting to imagine who might...

Have a guess what the most famous door in the UK might open onto. Perhaps the UK’s most beautiful woman? Perhaps … Liam Gallagher of Oasis? Perhaps it’s the door to the Chief’s office in The Bill? Well, that would be close to the most famous door in the UK! But this one has certainly seen many more people with much more power and influence than that one – it is Number 10 Downing Street, London , SW1A 2AA. It opens onto the British Prime Minister’s home, offices, meeting rooms and dining rooms. For such an important door, it is really very nondescript, if much cleaner and better-looked...

One of the oldest door knockers known to mankind is this one from the town of Olynthos in Ancient Macedonia, which has been dated at manufacture sometime around 340-430 BC. Nearly two and a half thousand years ago! The knocker is quite well made, considering the tools they would have had at the time to cast metal and so forth. This would have been on the door of one of the wealthiest people in the town … very lucky that we don’t have to be the richest person in our suburb or town to own a little bit of class like this! You can expect the knockers that we sell here to be standing in two and...

We may have discovered the origins of nose piercing, in this door knocker at Brasenose College in Oxford, England! This brass door knocker in the shape of a nose dates back to the twelfth century, when there were no celebrities with nose piercing, and the actual process would have been painful, unhygienic, and most likely involved a needle made from the bone of an animal, rather than beautiful shiny surgical steel… While the actual shape of the knocker is more like an abstract, imaginary nose than a realistic one, it was definitely created to look like a nose. The shaping of it is likely a representation...

What a gorgeous, different, outstanding door knocker! It was created by a French sculptor, Emile-Antoine Bourdelle early in the 1900s. Bourdelle believed that history’s best sculptures were those that were integrated with architecture – he would fit right in as a staff sculptor at Architectural Classics! He was born in 1861, and created the Medusa head sculpture four years before his death in 1925 – when his talent had already had a lifetime to fully develop. He was known as an expressionist artist, but his not-strictly-realistic work did not come from a lack of ability in detail. Medusa,...

You can just imagine these door knockers as a couple of grumpy old men, sitting at the side of a river fishing… or sitting on their porch perhaps whittling some wood or smoking a pipe! Those of you with the traditionally ubiquitous lion’s head knocker can also be grateful that not every door knocker has this amount of animation or personality. When Sarah has to pinch the door knocker’s nose shut to get the ring back in, you can see how you might have a bit of trouble doing that with a live lion’s head – with metal teeth, nonetheless! It is possible to buy these knockers online, but...