Dagenham’s industrial past has been given a new public face in east London. Two sculptures by British artist Ruth Ewan (b. 1980), unveiled this week at Dagenham Green, honor the Ford sewing machinists whose strike action helped lead to the 1970 Equal Pay Act.
The commission, titled “The Dagenham Agates,” stands on the site of the former Ford automotive factory, near the original picket lines and close to the still-operating car plant. Ewan’s works take the form of split boulders, each opened to reveal bands of color matched to paint shades used on cars in production during the strike periods, including the Ford Cortina.
One sculpture, “Dagenham Agate 1968,” represents the 187 women who took part in the first strike. The second, “Dagenham Agate (1984–85),” contains 150 layers in tribute to the women involved in the later strike in the winter of 1984–85. Local residents, including students, helped create those layers in workshops at Barking and Dagenham College, giving the project a direct connection to the community it commemorates.
The works were commissioned by the housing association Peabody and Hill Residential Ltd., with public art organization UP Projects producing the commission and helping organize the workshops. Adriana Marques, Peabody’s assistant director of Cultural Programming and Strategy, said such projects should be understood as “essential civic infrastructure,” not decorative additions.
The sculptures also mark the start of a heritage trail planned for the wider Dagenham Green development, which is being built on the 45-acre former Ford Stamping and Tooling Operations site. That broader framework matters: the commission does not simply memorialize a labor milestone, but embeds it in a changing urban landscape where housing, memory, and public space are being negotiated together.
The Dagenham machinists’ 1968 strike remains a landmark in British labor history. Their campaign exposed the gendered hierarchy of factory work and helped force a national conversation that culminated in equal pay legislation. Ewan’s intervention gives that history a durable, visible form — one that links industrial labor, community participation, and the evolving politics of public sculpture.
