GARGOYLE WEATHER VANE

The Gargoyle weathervane is one of our favorite designs here at West Coast Weather Vanes. It is particularly endearing in the small (one-foot sculpture size) although the large and extra-large sizes (three-foot or four-foot sculpture piece) tend to look quite spectacular perched atop a turret or cupola. We’ve even had customers train nightlights on their Gargoyle weather vanes so you can seem them against a dark sky when driving up to the house. They do tend to be quite a conversation starter!

One of the most interesting Gargoyle weathervanes we made was for an episode of the X-Files television show. Fellow UC Santa Cruz alum, Paul Rabwin, wanted to include one of our Gargoyle vanes in an episode he was producing. The challenge for us was that he needed it for shooting in three days! Because we make each weathervane to individual order, this required an unprecedented turnaround time. The way we managed to do it was to have all three of the weathervane makers pictured in the accompanying folder work on it simultaneously. The way we normally work here at West Coast Weather Vanes is to assign a particular weathervane to an individual craftsman, who sculpts the piece from start to finish and then signs their own work. In the case of this Gargoyle weathervane, all three weathervane makers ended up signing the weathervane – a very rare occurrence in the history of our business. See the photo above left, with our three weathervane makers. 

In the X-Files episode, the open scene focused on the Gargoyle, which set a top a small cupola. Lightning flashed in the background and its translucent red glass eyes glowed red in the ensuing burst of light. Very scary looking…. When customers order weathervanes from us, they get to choose what color eyes their creation receives. If you look closely at the large image of the Gargoyle weathervane featured on this page, you can see we made him with emerald colored translucent glass eyes.

The thumbnail on right is a variation of our "fierce" Gargoyle weathervane design. We made this "friendly" Gargoyle weather vane for a customer who wanted their gargoyle to have kinder features. Another customer paired one of our Gargoyle weathervanes with one of Dragon weathervanes so when the wind turned, the two creatures interacted with each other!

This Gargoyle weathervane is one of many custom mythological figures offered by West Coast Weather Vanes.  These custom copper Gargoyle weathervanes are part of our larger series of mythological weathervane designs that also feature Dragon weathervanes, Mermaid weathervanes and over 50 other mythological weathervane designs. Please visit our Mythological Weathervane page to learn more about our other Mythological weather vane designs. 

In contemporary fiction, gargoyles are typically depicted as a (generally) winged humanoid race with demonic features: generally horns, a tail, and talons. They are said to be guardians of the building on which they reside. These fictional gargoyles can generally use their wings to fly or glide, and are often depicted as having a rocky hide, or being capable of turning into stone in one way or another Although most gargoyles have grotesque features, the term gargoyle has come to include all types of images. Some gargoyles were depicted as monks, combinations of real animals and people, many of which were humorous. Unusual animal mixtures, or chimeras, did not act as rainspouts and are more properly called grotesques. They serve more as ornamentation, but are now synonymous with gargoyles.