One Birmingham
Red grew up watching his father work in construction and wanted a trade of his own to fall back on. He chose paint. He learned it at Brooklyn Technical College in Great Barr, where painting was taught as a discipline: the history of paints, color theory, decorating, and the patience to mix a batch by hand.
The City and Guilds of London Institute awarded him the Advanced Craft Certificate in Painting and Decorating. Three components. Distinction in all three.
Two Los Angeles
Then he came to the United States. In Los Angeles he worked as a journeyman painter on major hotel projects across the city. Big rooms, long corridors and fixed opening dates. The kind of work that teaches speed without letting the standard slip.
Three His own name
Then came the choice. Stay with the union and the security it offered, or go out alone. He took his contractor's license and started Red's Painting. The state has licensed the company since 1993, under the same number it holds today.
The practice is still family owned and still run by the man whose name is on it. What changed is the work. It moved into private houses, then into the kind of houses that arrive with an architect, a designer, an estate manager and a confidentiality clause.