Chadwick did not go to art school and had no formal training as a sculptor. Transferring his experience as an architectural draughtsman through to his sculptural technique, he began to weld in a unique and innovative way. He had started to develop a technique that fused solid form with the plastic energy of his earlier works, creating an "armature" of welded steel rods and a method of composition that played on the expressive potential of the framework and "skeletons" of his figures, while also constructing a firm, tactile "body". Chadwick built his sculptures using geometric space frames, to which he referred as "drawing in steel rods". He produced sculptures in iron, bronze and steel, which developed from mobiles to insect forms, animal forms and groups of male and female figures.