Artist Bill's still painting at 101

As he celebrates his 101st birthday, former railway yard worker Bill Holden shows no sign of giving up his favourite pastime — watercolour painting.

Over the last year he has built up a folio of about 80 pieces and has impressed fellow residents at Comberton Nursing Home, Stourbridge, where he celebrated his birthday.

Family and friends were there for Friday's event.

Bill, born and raised in New Street, Brierley Hill, travels around the Midlands with relatives — and photographs landscapes to paint.

He then spends hours reproducing images. Some works havecome from books of UK landscapes including the Lake District and the Norfolk Broads.

He said: "I enjoy painting — it keeps me busy and I like looking at all the different wildlife. Some of the staff at the home suggested it to me about a year ago and it has gone from there."

He worked in the railway yard at Brierley Hill's Round Oak Steel Works after leaving school at 14 until retiring at 68.

The seventh of eight children, he stayed in the town until 1988 when he moved to Wall Heath where he was until 2009 when he moved into the nursing home.

Although he never had any children and his wife died in 1982, he still has plenty of family and friends that visit him most weeks.

On his birthday he was joined by great nephew, Ben Robson, five, from Bristol with Ben's grandmother, Colleen Green, of Wordsley.