DESIGNS for elaborate Victorian ironworks have been unearthed in a city garden.

Andrew Reilly of Garrowhill made the discovery after lifting old paving slabs to find their undersides covered in writing and sketches.

Around 60 slabs carry decorative designs showing railings, gates, fountains and columns, each with their own name and number.

The slabs, which Andrew, 41, was removing in order to lay a patio, date back to at least the 1930s when the house was built.

They have now been revealed as lithographic stones, used to make prints for the long-defunct firm Walter Macfarlane.

The Glasgow ironworkers exported across the globe a century ago.

But mystery surrounds as to how they came to be in Mr Reilly's garden, or why they were discarded and used as building materials at the Edinburgh Road house.

The firm went bust after the Second World War, and its once-massive factory at Possilpark has long since been demolished, to be replaced by housing.

Mr Reilly said: "My son alerted me to what was on one of the slabs.

"I began to check the others and they all had designs on them, about 60 in all.

"I did not know what they were and it was a real surprise. I've lived here for years and the patio was already built when we moved in.

"They are really heavy, so I imagine that's why they were used as paving."

A investigation of the designs, which are incredibly well preserved despite their decades in the earth, revealed their displays to belong to the Saracen Foundry.

Set up by Walter Macfarlane and partners Thomas Russell and James Marshall in 1850, the ironworks produced thousands of pieces which decorated much of the north of the city and were sold across what was then the British Empire.

Experts think the slabs, inscribed with mirror-image text, were used in the preparation of catalogues.

Mr Reilly has offered the stones to Glasgow's People's Palace, although no decision has been taken on their fate.