Ken was born in Milngavie, Glasgow in 1936, but grew up in East Lothian. He was educated at the Knox Institute in Haddington, North Berwick Primary and George Watson’s School for Boys in Edinburgh. He studied architecture at Edinburgh College of Art between 1955 and 1960, in the years of William (Willie) Gillies and T. Elder Dickson as Principal and Vice Principal. During that time he won the Sloane Medallion and a scholarship to travel to Italy. From an early age he was good at drawing and he was soon to make a name for himself, as an employed architect, for his perspective drawings.

He married Sheila in 1960 and in 1972 with five children to feed Ken resigned from salaried employment to become a self employed artist. Between 1974 and 1979 the couple ran a coffee shop and gallery in Haddington called The Primrose Gallery. In 1986 we opened a gallery and gift shop in The Square, East Linton.

In Ken’s lifetime he produced an extensive range of greetings cards, limited edition prints, and a series of pictorial maps. Favourite places to paint were the West Coast of Scotland and nearer to home, the fishing villages of Fife and of course East Lothian. He was greatly influenced by Chinese and Japanese art and the works of Turner, Mactaggart, Rowland Hilder and the Scottish Colourists including Joan Eardley. Exhibitions of his work were held regularly throughout Scotland and he was always a popular tutor to many art groups.

Ken was a much loved and gifted watercolour artist; his great philosophy being “less is more”.