Although I had always dabbled in watercolour painting as a hobby, I only came to botanical painting quite late.

It was in 2005; we visited the “One Thousand Years of Botanical Painting” exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, and I was totally captivated by the beautifully intricate representation of plants, and how, over the years, these paintings had become a record of flora of past centuries, and I realised I wanted to do something similar; something that would benefit future generations of botanists.

But I realised this would need a lot of training and practice to get to the standard which botanical art requires…

Then when I retired as a school principal in 2009, I decided that, at the age of 60, I would take up botanical art as a career… After a distance learning course with the London Art College, I took the diploma course for the UK Society of Botanical Artists, where I achieved a distinction, and am now a Fellow of the Society.

My studio where I work at home looks out on to my garden and to the South China Sea beyond…

My garden is a great inspiration to me, and a microcosm of the biodiversity we have here in Hong Kong. I have planted things like bougainvillea, Chinese privet, etc which attract and encourage birds – cheeky little white-eyes, crested bulbuls, magpie robins and passing stonechats and minivets - and a great array of butterflies and dragonflies - and as dusk falls, the bats which roost in my fan-palm (Livistona chinensis) come and dart around in the twilight.

The flowers and trees in my garden provide many of the subjects of my work.

The French TV5 channel did a program about Lantau a few years ago, which featured quite a lot about me and my work - it has me in English, with a French voice-over… you can watch it by clicking here…. (I am on from 6.15 to 12.20..)

There was also a 14 min video podcast made by the local Hong Kong group “MM”- you can see it here. (It is me in English with some Cantonese and subtitles)

And I featured on the cover of our local “Life on Lantau” glossy magazine - see here.

Some examples of my work are displayed on this website, along with details about the book “Portraits of Trees of Hong Kong and Southern China” which I produced along with Hong Kong University. (PLEASE NOTE… Chinese version now available…! in HK bookshops or Amazon)

Originals and prints of my works are available - please email me for details

The book is available in Lantau and Hong Kong bookshops, and on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk