Germany · The early chapters, 1962 - 1978
Where the story began
I was born in Hilden in 1962 and grew up with my grandparents in Bad Bentheim. At sixteen, I moved to Hamburg—a change of scale and pace that opened another chapter in my life. Germany remains an important part of who I am, even after many years abroad.
My academic interests led me to study skinhead culture for my Master’s thesis at the University of Hamburg. Questions about identity, ideology and how people see one another also run through my essays and creative writing. I’m interested in the stories we tell about ourselves, and in what happens when those stories meet someone else’s perspective.
University years · Hamburg, 1982/96
Study and Serve
I started studying Tibetology but after a few days I decided that Sociology would be at better fit.
And along the way I did courses in History (mainly Irish History), German, English, Economics, Politics, Philosophy, Psychology, Social and Economic History, and Parapsychology (!)'.
In between starting and finishing my studoes with an MA, I went abroad for two years and did my 'alternative service', the mandatory non-military service performed in place of military conscription (which I did with the Malteser Hilfsdienst e.V. (MHD), a major Catholic relief and social service organization in Germany).
University years abroad · Warwick, 1988/89 · York, 1991/92
Early connections with Britain
In 1988/89, I spent a year as a visiting student at the University of Warwick. Decades later, I would return to work there—a connection between my student years and professional life that I couldn’t have anticipated at the time.
Another year combined visiting study at the University of York with work as a Foreign Language Assistant at Lowfield School. I didn’t return to York in later life, but teaching and education kept finding their way back into my story: first through language teaching, and later through developing websites and virtual learning environments for George Salter Academy.
Prague 1996/99 · Then Birmingham, from 1999
Languages, places and people
I spent around three years in Prague as a German Language teacher at the largest private language school, The London School of Modern Languages, before moving to Birmingham in 1999. Living in different countries has shaped my outlook: I feel connected to my German roots, at home in Britain and part of a wider European conversation.
Before moving into web work, I spent seven years teaching languages, from classroom groups in Prague to intensive one-to-one lessons at Berlitz in Birmingham. Helping someone understand something new requires listening, patience and an ability to explain clearly. Those habits have stayed with me, even as the subject of my work has changed.
Learning languages has also been part of my own journey. I picked up basic French mainly at school, very basic Czech while living in Prague, and basic Italian through evening classes in Birmingham. I wouldn’t claim fluency in any of those three, but each has offered another way into a place and its culture.
A career with the web · 2004 to now
Making things easier to understand
Over more than twenty years in web communication, I’ve worked across education and the private sector. At the University of Birmingham, my roles included leading the College of Social Sciences web team. From 2012 to 2019, I worked as a Web and VLE Developer at George Salter Academy, returning to a secondary-school setting through the web and its virtual learning environment. Today, as a Web Communication Executive at the University of Warwick, I bring together user experience, accessibility, content, search and evidence to help people find their way through websites.
I enjoy the combination of practical making and collaborative thinking: understanding a problem, building something useful and seeing how it can improve. I’m also interested in making the web more sustainable and exploring how AI can support digital communication. My Work & CV pages tell that part of the story in more detail.
2008 · 2012 · 2022
A shared life in Birmingham
I met Nicola Scott in 2008; we became a couple in 2012 and married on 5 November 2022. Birmingham is our home, and our rescue cat Corey is very much part of the household. Cats have been a recurring presence in my life, with Akhil-Llewellyn in Hamburg and Grumpy, the neighbour's cat we eventually adopted also holding their places in its story.
Outside work, I enjoy cooking, travelling, long-distance walks and once upon a time riding my motorbike. I learned Scottish country dancing in Prague, and it has remained another way to meet people and share an interest across borders.
The creative thread · Then and now
Words, images and possibilities
Writing poetry and stories gives me room to explore feelings and contradictions that don’t always fit neatly into ordinary conversation. Photography offers a different kind of attention: noticing a passing moment, an unexpected detail or a familiar place from a new angle. Some of my photographs have been selected for a local commercial calendar for three consecutive years.
Music brings these interests together in Unione MusiKi, where I use Suno to explore how one poem, The Definition of Love, changes across languages and musical styles. It combines my interest in language and emotion with a curiosity about what new technology makes possible.
Volunteering at international SCI workcamps, including projects at memorial sites, is another long-standing part of my life. Working alongside people from different backgrounds connects practical activity with history, remembrance and shared experience.
These interests often overlap. A place can become a photograph, a thought can become a poem, and a poem can take on another life as music. This website is where I bring those different parts of myself together.