Painter, pottery designer and writer, illustrator and teacher, born in Ipswich, Suffolk. Aged 12 he became a delivery boy for a florist’s, then was at local Art School, 1922–6, followed by Royal College of Art, to which he won a Royal Exhibition and where he was taught by Reco Capey. Joined Mintons Ltd in 1929 and soon became art director, but left in 1935, miffed at resistance to his efforts to improve designs. He became head of Stoke School of Art until 1941, holding a similar position at Burslem School of Art until 1945, when he became a freelance painter, writer on pottery and porcelain and lecturer. His books on Lane Delph, Staffordshire Chimney Ornaments, English Country Pottery and his two Encyclopaedias of English and Continental Pottery and Porcelain were scholarly and readable.