The Kelpies
Two 30-metre horse heads, each weighing about 300 tonnes, rise beside the M9 near Falkirk, and the real horses behind them were Clydesdales named Duke and Baron.
Published
Quick Facts
- Location
- The Helix park, Falkirk, beside the M9 and the Forth and Clyde Canal
- Opened
- Completed in 2013; the Helix park opened in 2013 as part of the Helix project
- Height
- 30 metres, making them the largest equine sculptures in the world
- Weight
- About 300 tonnes each
- Sculptor
- Andy Scott
- Materials
- Stainless steel plates over a steel framework
- Real-life models
- Clydesdale horses named Duke and Baron
- Purpose
- Celebrating Scotland's horse-powered industrial heritage and marking the canal link to the Forth
Two horse heads the size of a ten-storey building
Drive along the M9 near Falkirk and you might do a double take. Two giant horse heads, one rearing up and the other lowered, rise 30 metres from the landscape, their steel skins catching the light. They are the largest equine sculptures on Earth. Each is made of stainless steel plates fixed to a steel frame, and each weighs about 300 tonnes. They stand at the heart of The Helix, a large park created on the edge of Falkirk. The name matters, because these are not just horses. They are kelpies, the shape-shifting water spirits of Scottish folklore.
The sculptor who made a myth out of a Clydesdale
The artist was Glasgow-based sculptor Andy Scott, who won the commission for what became the centrepiece of the Helix project. His idea was to combine two ideas: the mythical kelpie and the working horse. The real models were Clydesdales, the heavy horses bred in Lanarkshire and once the muscle of Scottish farms, quarries and canals. Scott's models were named Duke and Baron. He first made them as small maquettes, then scaled the design up to monumental size. That link to real animals is the point. These are monuments to horsepower in its most literal form, to the animals that hauled barges, ploughs and coal across the central belt.
Why a water spirit?
In Scottish folklore, a kelpie is a creature that haunts rivers and lochs. It usually appears as a horse, often a handsome one, tempting travellers to climb on its back. Once they do, their hands stick fast and the kelpie plunges into the water to drown them. That is the myth. The reality here is more benevolent. The sculptures sit beside a canal basin, with water at their feet, so the folklore fits the setting neatly. The horses' heads are a nod to both stories: a legend of danger from the water and a real history of animals that worked beside it.
Built to link two waterways
The Kelpies stand beside the Forth and Clyde Canal, close to where it meets the Forth. They mark the eastern gateway to the canal, which links the east and west coasts of Scotland's central belt. The Helix project was designed to transform a stretch of land around Falkirk and Grangemouth, with parkland, paths and a canal extension. The Kelpies became the visual anchor of that plan. The canal had a revival of its own in the Millennium era, helped by another Falkirk marvel, the Falkirk Wheel, a rotating boat lift nearby. Together they make the town an unlikely capital of modern canal engineering.
What to look out for when you visit
Walk right up to the sculptures and you can see the stainless steel plates that make up their skin. The plates are laid so that the heads shimmer and shift in different light, and they look quite different on a bright day than at dusk. At night the Kelpies are lit up, and the light plays across their surfaces. Visitors can also take a guided tour that goes inside one of the heads. One head is raised and the other lowered, so the pair look like two moments in the same animal's day. Walk around them to see how the composition changes from each angle, and look for the reflections in the canal.
Notable people
- Andy Scott