My friend Jack Crofton, who has died aged 73, set up his own company in 1966, initially making the wax mouldings for sculptors including Jacob Epstein and Enzo Plazzotta. As the business grew, he began casting in bronze, naming the company Meridian Bronze after its location in Greenwich, south-east London. He took on other highly skilled workers, and as the foundry grew in size and reputation found new premises in Peckham, where, using the sand casting method, large-scale monumental casting became possible.
Meridian became the foundry of choice for sculptors including Lynn Chadwick, Reg Butler, Henry Moore, Elisabeth Frink, John Skeaping, James Butler, Anthony Caro and Antony Gormley. The company made the Ivor Roberts-Jones statue of Churchill in Parliament Square; the Mountbatten memorial by Franta Belsky in Horse Guards Parade; and Jomo Kenyatta by James Butler, in Nairobi.
Jack was born in Limerick, the third of five children. He was three years old when the family moved to Newport, south Wales. Jack became an apprentice coppersmith in the dockyards before studying sculpture at Newport School of Art. He drew beautifully, but the tactile was his gift: his hands were large and powerful and making was his destiny.
He married Megan Jones, a painter and fellow student at Newport School of Art and they had two sons, Michael and Justin. Jack lived in Risca, south Wales, before moving the family to London, where he worked at the Morris Singer Foundry.
He loved climbing and sailing and some time before his retirement in 1998 bought a derelict steel schooner, lying in the Caribbean. He refurbished and sailed Stormbird back to London, living on board with his partner Patricia Yorwath. In 1999 they sailed around Europe and along the coast of Africa before crossing the Atlantic to Brazil, up to the Caribbean, where, although Jack was diagnosed with prostate cancer, they spent the next decade cruising, often in dangerous situations – piracy was rife. They eventually moored in Spain and Portugal, from where Jack could fly home for hospital care.
His bravery and fortitude were qualities that were obvious to those who knew him long before illness struck and his extraordinary strength and courage allowed him to survive well beyond medical expectations. Two years ago he sailed back to London, and settled near Maidstone, Kent. In early November, he made his final voyage in Stormbird, sailing with his family up the Thames to London, before moving into the Heart of Kent Hospice, Maidstone.
He is survived by Megan, Michael and Justin, and his grandchildren, Luke, Hannah, Jacob and Ellen; and by Patricia.