The commission was awarded in May 2007, and designs were worked up in consultation with Croydon Council.  The 'tying strands' concept was developed with CAD software and card maquettes.

The use of text to provide local links was proposed in the initial stages, but finding an effective way to include it within the artwork design required careful consideration.

Paring the text down to short groups of words in four languages was established as the best approach.  The following diagrams show the patterns and translations for each pillar artwork (Gujarati=Red, Bengali=Blue, Urdu=Green).