David Ramsay Hay

1798-1866

Was the son of Rebekah or Rebecca Carmichael, a published poet and friend of Robert Burns. They lived at the foot of Monteith's Close off the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. After her husband died prematurely and penniless, David was educated at the expense of her brother, David Ramsay, a banker and owner of the Edinburgh Evening Courant, then apprenticed as a reading-boy in Ramsay's printing office in Edinburgh. Instead though (around 1813), Hay moved to join Gavin Beugo, a decorative artist, based in West Register Street in Edinburgh's New Town. His fellow-apprentice was his friend, the topographical artist David Roberts. In April 1820 he commenced work at Abbotsford for Walter Scott.  In 1850 he decorated Holyroodhouse for Queen Victoria. Hay was an advocate of imitative finishes such as graining and marbling, and textured paints to imitate brocade fabrics. From 1828, he developed his theory of colour harmony over six successive editions of his book, The Laws of Harmonious Colouring Adapted to Interior Decorations. Hay wrote about his experience decorating Abbotsford for Walter Scott in the sixth edition of his Harmonious Colouring. He published many elaborate works on the theory and practice of the fine arts, most of them illustrated by his own designs; moved in the most cultivated Edinburgh society of his day; and accumulated a fine collection of pictures and other art objects. He was a member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, before whom he read a paper ‘On an Application of the Laws of Numerical Harmonic Ratio to Forms generally, and particularly to that of the Human Figure;’ In 1846 Hay received from the Royal Scottish Society of Arts a silver medal ‘for his machine for drawing the perfect egg-oval or composite ellipses. In his final years he had exclusive premises at 90 George Street in the centre of Edinburgh's New Town.