Godwin worked in a variety of materials including stone,
bronze,
terracotta and
fibreglass. His
modernist style is considered to follow
Maillol more than the expressionist style of
Lehmbruck. He first came to public prominence in 1951. He exhibited several works at the
South Bank as part of the
Festival of Britain including a
relief of
Neptune in
Basil Spence's
Sea and Ships exhibit and his life-size figures of
Alfred Russel Wallace,
Charles Darwin and
Thomas Henry Huxley in
The Living World section. The same year he exhibited the terracotta
Sitting woman and
bath stone Mother and child at the Exhibition of the
Royal Scottish Academy of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, The One-Hundred-and-Twenty-Fifth. The unveiling ceremony, performed by
Sir Hugh Casson was filmed by
Pathé. Span subsequently commissioned Godwin for a piece for their 1958 Blackheath development.
The Architect and Society is the figure of a man set into a niche supporting a weight of concrete satirising the developer's struggle with the local authority to obtain permission to build there. Four reliefs attributed to Godwin by
Pevsner adorn
Reed's early 1960s building on the corner of Half Moon Street and the
A4, Piccadilly in London. They depict an owl in a tree, Neptune, a
Harlequin with guitar and
Diana the huntress.
The Philosopher in
Harlow was commissioned by
Essex County Council for the new
Harlow Technical College in 1960. Constructed in fibreglass and executed in 1961–62, it is sited in College Square in Harlow Town Centre.
Guy and the Boar, commissioned by the Annol Development Company in 1964 and presented to Warwick Council, is situated on a traffic island on the
A429 road in
Warwick. It commemorates
Guy of Warwick and the
boar he killed, one of his many heroic feats. The sculpture is made of cast concrete, set on a stone plinth and concrete base. Also in 1964 Godwin produced a "Wool Mural" for the entrance hall of the
International Wool Secretariat headquarters
Wool House in
Carlton Gardens. In 1970 the
Scott Trust commissioned a piece from Godwin to celebrate the centenary of the
Manchester Evening News. A two-part work in steel on a red granite aggregate base, the latter reflecting the red stone of the neighbouring
John Rylands Library. Although Godwin did not name the work it was called
Vigilance by Laurence Scott, grandson of
C. P. Scott, and was unveiled by
Sir William Hayley in May 1971. It stood outside the newspaper's offices until 2003 when it was removed during development of the
Spinningfields site but has not since been reinstated, despite the developer's commitment to do so. Other works by Godwin include
Polar Theme at
Philips former Laboratories in
Salfords,
Redhill, Surrey and
Fountain at
ATV Elstree Studios. ==Death and legacy==