W. Gray Young

[2] Born in Oamaru, the son of a Scottish watchmaker and jewellery retailer, he moved with his family to Wellington in the 1890s.

He won the competition for Knox College in Dunedin in 1906 when he was only 21 and became an associate of the New Zealand Institute of Architects (NZIA) in 1907.

The same year his Scots College building was opened and in 1928 the Wellesley Club which earned him the NZIA gold medal.

Later architects continued to work to realise and elaborate his original idea for decades after his death, an unusual outcome in New Zealand, even for a highly emblematic building.

[4] He was president of the Wellington Rotary Club from 1935 to 1936 but did not care for public life, preferring the company of colleagues and a group of yachting friends.

W. Gray Young (right)