11 Most Endangered Historic Places
Philip Simmons' Workshop and Home
Year Listed: 2007
Location: Charleston, South Carolina
Significance
The home of Philip Simmons in Charleston, South Carolina.
Credit: National Trust for Historic Preservation
The workshop and home of Philip Simmons (1912 – 2009) are significant for their association with the legendary blacksmith. The buildings offer a tangible connection to Mr. Simmons and to a unique cultural tradition that has passed from one generation to another for hundreds of years. Mr. Simmons learned the blacksmithing trade from a former slave in the 1920s and was recognized with the National Heritage Fellowship Award by the National Endowment for the Arts, their highest honor for a traditional artist. Elected to the South Carolina Hall of Fame, Mr. Simmons also received the state's highest award, the Order of the Palmetto. His Star and Fish gate, created on the national mall during the Folklife Festival is now in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution.
After devoting himself exclusively to decorative ironwork in 1938, Philip Simmons created more than 500 pieces, primarily gates, in Charleston. All of his work in creating new ironwork and in restoring historic decorative ironwork was done from his modest home and forge on Charleston's East Side. There is an effort underway to catalogue Mr. Simmons' work in Charleston and capture his stories. These efforts need to include the preservation of his home and workshop, but no such plan is in place.
For centuries, African-American blacksmiths created works that were both utilitarian and beautiful; but in recent years the craft has begun to die out, and few artisans remain. Philip Simmons was one of the few remaining blacksmiths in the area. Throughout his long life, Simmons demonstrated the marriage of art and craft and the gates and fences he created can be seen throughout Charleston. Visitors to the restored area of the city see in the historic Charleston a long tradition of blacksmithing going back hundreds of years, thanks to Simmons.
The shop, though not architecturally significant, was given to him by his former mentor and teacher Peter Simmons (no relation), an ex-slave who had inherited it from his father, Guy Simmons, a slave.
