Newport blacksmith focuses on architectural iron work

By: Rachel Cartwright
Posted In: Features

Pieces of twisted metal lie in haphazard heaps on the ground like arms and legs, waiting to be formed into a body. Dust from the floor, like the jazz on the stereo, hangs in the air. Five days a week, starting at 8 a.m., this is where Bob Rotondo does his trade as a blacksmith.

Bob Rotondo, 57, didn’t intend to pound metal for a living when he started. He had already graduated from college with a degree in political science when he was introduced to it. Yet, he was drawn into this dying trade because it allowed him to express himself.

The Connecticut native was also drawn to Newport, where he became actively involved in the community. If you know where to look, you can see the signs of his quiet influence on Newport: on the gates of Ocean Drive, railings and fences for Historical Buildings, on people, and even on the trees.

Rotondo was born in Simsbury, Connecticut, a small town of about 2,500 people. Out of high school, he headed to John Carroll University, in Cleveland, Ohio. But after graduating in 1969, he wasn’t sure what to do with his Political Science degree.

“I had been concentrating in international law, and the more I looked into it, it seemed that there was none,” Rotondo says. “Plus this was the sixties and politics were kind of messy.

Rotondo decided to take time off to travel. To save money he worked in a factory as a welder, and for the next couple of years he moved about the country. He heard of a blacksmith school in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and decided to pursue it. It sounded like fun, and it would allow Rotondo to tap his creative side through metal working, he recalls.

“What began as something to gain money without thought to future turned into something I loved,” Rotondo says. “I started to notice things about myself. I remember when I was younger how my friends and I would beat and shape metal pans, and carve tiki dolls out of wood and steal our brothers and parents’ jewelry for eyes.”

In 1973, Rotondo headed west. The school in Santa Fe was small. Frank Turley, who had learned his trade by shoeing horses for the U.S. cavalry, taught students in a shed he built himself. There were four anvils, four forges, and room for four students.

Turley taught his students basic blacksmithing tasks. They began by making four link chains. Rotondo also learned how to make farm implements, large fork and spoon sets, and how to shoe a horse.

“At this point, this was when I knew this was what I was made for,” Rotondo says. “The metal, when it gets red hot, when you begin throwing it around, becomes pliable.”

After graduating from Turley’s school in 1976, Rotondo headed home for a visit and then decided to drive to New Orleans. But Rotondo only made it as far as Newport. A blacksmith named Tom Crawford was advertising for an assistant, which was rare. Rotondo decided to take the opportunity and stay.

“There are only three blacksmiths left in the universe,” Rotondo jokes.

Blacksmithing is physically taxing, with lots of hammering and lifting. And, the market can be hard to break into. Today, Rotondo stays in business because he has found a niche doing architectural iron work.

It was during this time that he met Andrea Hollis, a sculptor who graduated from Rhode Island School of Design. Fresh out of college, she was working as a waitress in a bar in Providence. For him it was instant attraction. She thought he was a friendly, amiable guy and easy to talk to. Rotondo became a regular, and they quickly became friends.

“I remember one night I had a full house. I looked at him from across the room and I asked myself, could I marry this guy? And that wasn’t something I usually asked myself,” Hollis remembers. “And I thought to myself, ‘nah.'”

But they remained close friends. Two years later, Hollis approached Rotondo about getting some parts she needed for a sculpture she was working on.

“She needed some metal work done,” Rotondo remembers. “And of course I kept taking longer than possible to prolong it.”

The two went out, and Hollis describes it as love at first date. They decided to get married on Labor Day of 1978.

“We’re both so much about work,” Hollis says. “I thought this was a good omen.”

Three years later, in 1981, Rotondo opened his own foundry on 50 Friendship Street. Placed snugly between houses separated by thin strips of weeds for yards, the sprawling boxy building stands out. The whitewash is faded over cement cinderblocks, and many of the windows are cracked and boarded up.

Inside the shop is a blend of chaos and order. Tools are carefully lined up against the wall, but the floor space is full of islands that you need to navigate around. Beautifully finished panels of staircases lie on their sides, and the cold iron blooms into patterns of circles and curves, right next to hunks of untouched metal.

Jim Estes, an architect that uses Rotondo’s work, relies on it for both lighting and interior railing on staircases.

“You walk in there and it looks like such a collection of parts,” Estes says. “But his final work is well crafted and beautiful. It’s like a rose growing out of the ashes.”

Through their friendship of 20 years, Rotondo has worked closely with Dan Snydacker, head of the Newport Historical Society. Rotondo has done numerous jobs for the historical society, including railings for both the Redwood Library and Wanton-Lyman-Hazard house. Snydacker admires on Rotondo’s ability to solve problems quickly and deliver beautiful, quality work.

He recently approached Rotondo to help create banner displays for various locations around Newport, directing tourists from the Gateway Center, across America’s Cup, to Washington Square.

“We were looking around in different areas for something with round poles and we couldn’t find anything ready made,” Snydacker says. “So we sat down with Bob, and within a couple of minutes he solved our problem.”

Jim Estes says that it’s this understanding of what clients want and how to create it for them that makes Rotondo so successful. It’s what keeps clients coming back and attracts new ones.

In 1994 he was contracted by Gianni Versace to create two dressing room doors for his South Beach, Miami home. Rotondo built them in Newport from the specifications sent to him. He created work that looked old, inspired by Roman ruins. Hollis used her skills to sculpt a medusa head for the doorknob and the oculus, which is a round ornament at the top of the door. Versace loved the results.

In 1991 and 1993, Rotondo was commissioned by Tiffany & Co. to create several window pieces and a staircase for one of their Philadelphia stores.

Snydacker traveled through Philadelphia, and on the recommendation of Rotondo, stopped in to see the spiral staircase. He describes it as strikingly beautiful, befitting the elegance of Tiffany’s. As a favor for Rotondo, he pulled out a camera to take pictures of it, as Rotondo had never kept any for his portfolio.

“I was immediately surrounded by security guards,” Snydacker says. “I tried to explain that I knew the man that made it, but I was gently escorted out of the building and I never got the pictures.”

Bob Rotondo isn’t preoccupied with his success in business. Getting him to talk about his more famous clients is like trying to pull roots out of the ground. It is when he talks about his family and friends that he talks for hours.

“You could spend a whole night with him, when at that time he’ll be working on a project for someone like Versace,” Snydacker says. “And instead he’ll talk about his kids and his friends. He just rolls his eyes when I bring stuff like that up.”

Rotondo is also very active in the Newport community. He was a charter member of the Newport Tree Co-Op, started in 1994, which has replanted hundreds of trees on public property in the Newport area. The organization convinces people to plant trees in their neighborhood and take good care of them.

With a donation of $100, a neighborhood can have a tree planted in their community on the public land. Scott Wheeler, the current Tree Warden, believes that this promotes a feeling of pride and stewardship towards the trees in that neighborhood. That pride wouldn’t be felt by having the city simply plant them there itself.

“It’s based on the principle that the best way to get trees planted in a neighborhood isn’t for the individuals to be approached, but to have the neighborhood work together and coordinate planting on their street. They’ll look after it better-they’ll water it, and keep kids from climbing on it and breaking the branches,” Wheeler says. “They’ll literally and figuratively have ownership of these trees.”

But the Newport Tree Co-Op faced opposition from some community members when it was first created. Some people wondered whether the city should spend money on this program instead of others. Rotondo played a major part in the success of the program through his quiet leadership and passion to the cause.

“The crisis we faced is that the majority of the Newport forest was in decline, being lost, and needing to be replaced,” says Wheeler. “This is why finding a replacement program is so necessary. Bob helped establish this as a legitimate program.”

Rotondo has also coached for little league baseball and soccer between 1991 and 1999. He coached little league with Chris Reidy, whose son played on the same team with Rotondo’s.

At first, the kids didn’t know what to make of Rotondo. When a lot of people meet him for the first time, Rotondo admits that they can be a little intimidated. Rotondo is tall and solidly built. His full head of graying hair is shaggy and wild looking, and tangles into an equally wild beard. But people who get to know Rotondo learn that he’s a complete softy.

“You know that big chest of his? It’s filled with heart,” Hollis says.

Rotondo had a lot of patience when working with the children. He would often take one off to the side to give him extra advice or talk.

“I was the one who would run the practice, but he would work one on one,” Reidy says. “He has a heart of gold. He’d take them aside and talk about their feelings, about what was happening, and he reached them on a personal level.”

His children are out of sports now and growing up. His daughter is a sophomore at Rogers High School, and his son is a sophomore in college at the University of Rochester in New York.

Thirty-five years after his own graduation from college, Rotondo has always thought he might start doing something with his Political Science degree. But the pull of blacksmithing is strong. Rotondo loves solving peoples’ design problems and creating distinctive work that they are proud to display in their home.

“I’m a lucky man that everything turned out just right,” Rotondo says. “I work for myself, the money’s fine, and nothing I do is ever the same. It’s really been a blessing.”