Tim grew up in the ‘Chalk country’ of the North Downs, which explains his subsequent obsession with hard rocks! After a first degree at Aberystwyth (and falling in love with structural geology) his PhD work at Dundee was on the Caledonides of Arctic Norway. During a short spell at Newcastle University he had the privilege to train our greatly missed friend and colleague Paul Younger (among others!) in mapping and structural geology. He joined the Deep Geology Unit of the Geological Survey in 1983 and has applied the skills of the ‘deep geologist’ ever since, for regional subsurface mapping, resource assessment and analysis of seismic hazard, in the UK, and in countries as diverse as Australia, Papua New Guinea and the UAE. He was lead author of the Tectonic Map published by BGS and the Geological Survey of Ireland. His present interest is in the assessment and development of deep basinal geothermal resources in the UK.