Youth being cast [© Henrion Family Archive]

FOR 70 years, she sat under a fig tree in a north London garden and weathered the sun, rain, sleet and snow.

But now Daphne  Hardy Henrion’s Youth can come inside after being donated to the Museum of London.

It’s a lovely little treasure-hunt tale.

Sarah Gaventa, an independent curator, has been trying to trace the art which lit up the Festival of Britain in 1951 and did the legwork to track this particular piece down.

A second version being collected from a Hampstead garden [Museum of London]

Henrion, who died in 2003, had been asked to create her sculpture, a thin, athletic woman, for a spot outside architect Leonard Manasseh’s 51 Bar on the South Bank.

She cast two: one ended up in Mr Manasseh’s back garden, and the other tracked down to Hampstead. It’s this second version which has been carefully packaged up and taken to the grateful museum.

The museum’s curator, Francis Marshall, said: “She made a cast for the festival, and then a second.

It is not unusual for this to happen – her contemporaries such as Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore did this – and it seems she kept a version.”

Youth in situ on the South Bank at the Festival of Britain [© Henrion Family Archive]

He added: “London has a long history of public art, all of which adds to the culture of the city. Youth in particular highlights a time in London’s history where art was at the core of a national celebration, seeing rejuvenation to a country devastated by war.”

He’s right. Public art really does liven up our city. You’ll like some of it, you’ll hate other bits, but what a dull place it would be without it.

Daphne’s son, Paul, said he was excited the museum would restore his mother’s work and felt it would be given a “new lease of life” for future generations to enjoy.

It’s a commendable motive, the kind that keeps our museum and galleries such special places to visit.