St Nicholas’s School, Porton, Wiltshire, July 13th 2011

Some time ago, I had an idea to paint the outline of Bloodhound SSC on a school playground.  I checked on the project website to see if any other school had done this and could find no mention of it.  We could have a world first!

The first headteacher that I approached asked me if I could do it with masking tape, so that the image wouldn’t remain on the playground.  I then suggested it to another headteacher who asked me what sort of paint I would be using and would it come off.

I then asked David Rolfe, the headteacher of St Nicholas’s, and he was delighted with the idea.  I spent what was the coldest day of the winter at the school with my Bloodhound Roadshow.  Mr Rolfe had bought the paint and brushes and I had printed an outline of the car on a squared grid but, unfortunately, we decided that it was too cold for the children to sit around on the playground and the paint probably wouldn’t have set anyway.  We finally managed to arrange a date towards the end of the summer term and it was on July 13th that I returned to Porton.

Miss Winchcombe selected a group of seven children to help me and we began.  This time I had used the project’s CAD files to print out a better outline of the car.  The measuring tape was nailed to the playground and two children set off along it chalking out a grid of 50cm squares using squares of hardboard as templates.  Once they had drawn a few squares I was able to begin chalking the outline of the car and the painting began.  Supervising seven children armed with brushfuls of gloss paint was an interesting experience, and I was grateful for the assistance of Mrs Trowern, who also did an excellent job of straightening up the chalk lines where necessary.  We managed to get the job done with no paint spilt and the minimum of drips here and there.

Mr Rolfe, Miss Winchcombe and the children were delighted to be the first school in the world with an image of Bloodhound SSC on the playground, and I was very pleased that I had had the idea in the first place and that the afternoon had gone so well.

Will other schools copy us?  We’ll see…

Chris Henley
Bloodhound Ambassador

Below: a time-lapse video of the the painting!

(pictures reproduced with kind permission from the school)