Safety and Security

These figures are on the Guardian Royal Exchange Insurance building on the north corner of St Andrews Square and George Street in Edinburgh, designed for the Caledonian Insurance Company by Leslie Grahame-Thomson and Frank J Connell in 1938-40.

I have known this building for years and walk past it regularly, but it was today that I realised what was familiar about it. These statuesque figures - Safety and Security - bear a strong resemblance to the work we saw in Helsinki last summer, notably on the city's central railway station, by Eero Saarinen. In The Buildings of Edinburgh, they are described as showing "a touch of Scandinavian conviction".

They were the last prestigious works by sculptor Alexander Carrick (1882-1966).