My ancestry is Norwegian and French on my father's side, hence the surname, Danish, Scottish, and English on my mother's side. I was born in Lower Hutt in the 1950s, and lived most of my younger years at Paraparaumu.  I have been blessed with the hands that came to me from my family, a long line of jewellers, goldsmiths, and watchmakers, on my father's French side and also very hands-on people from my mother's side, a cooper amongst them.

My father taught me basic wood working skills and I was used to making things from a young age. I started woodcarving in 1974 as a balance for the study at university. Gradually the carving became more important than the Social Sciences. The feeling that the only thing I had ever really found satisfying was making things with my hands came to the fore, so I left university to follow the carving. Initially I made furniture out of recycled native wood with the carving being something on the side. An early meeting with Owen Mapp in 75' turned me on to bone carving for which I am forever grateful to him. The carving world of the Māori has always fascinated me, and was my starting point, particularly the bone and stone. In 1979 I was invited by Matahi Greg Whakatuka-Brightwell to be one of the team working on the rock carving project at Mine Bay on Lake Taupo, and spent two summers carving the in volca-situ volcanic stone of the cliffs overlooking the lake.

I have moved around and lived in lots of places, Mangaweka, Karamia, Holloway Road (Wellington), and Pukerua Bay. In 1982 I was awarded a grant from the QE II Arts Council and travelled to Papua New Guinea for five months studying the carving cultures there, a fantastic opportunity to see a whole new world of carving. 1984 saw me in Los Angeles for the Olympic Games Arts festival as a guest artist supporting the Kahurangi Exhibition. As a carver I have also been exposed to the world of hard stone carving, through people like Donn Salt, and John Edgar, thanks is also due there. In the early eighties I started to work hard stone realizing that it was the logical step from the bone. 

In 1987 I left Pukerua Bay to marry Mary-Anne Crompton, who worked for the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign affairs and Trade. She has whakapapa to Te Ati Awa and Taranaki.  This started my life as a following partner in the New Zealand diplomatic service. Almost two years in Solomon Island was followed by three years in Vanuatu, both very stimulating places for my work.  Access to local hardwoods and amazing shells featured. Our son Jacob was born at the end of 1988, in Wellington and we returned to Vanuatu when he was five weeks old and where I balanced primary caregiver for him and carving.

We also lived in Moscow Russia for almost four years in the mid-90s. Moscow was a very rewarding posting for tools, material, and techniques, as at that time there was a lot of good quality diamond cutting gear available as well as very high-quality jade and other semi precious stones. I learnt a lot about the techniques of cutting and polishing there. Christmas 1998 saw us back in New Zealand and we lived at Paraparaumu Beach, two hundred meters from high tide, for the following seven years, time enough for me to continue my exploration of stone carving as well as several sculpture symposiums with soft stone. At the end of 2004 we moved to Geneva, Switzerland, to take up a four-year posting.  Europe provided exposure to a wide range of art and access to marble and other stones.

I continue carving at our home in Paraparaumu Beach with a wide range of materials including pounamu, shell, bone, stone and wood.