25 Facts About Stephen Wiltshire

Stephen Wiltshire was born on 24 April 1974 and is a British architectural artist and autistic savant.

Stephen Wiltshire is known for his ability to draw a landscape from memory after seeing it just once.

In 2006, Wiltshire was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to art.

Stephen Wiltshire was born in London in 1974 to Caribbean parents; his father, Colvin, was a native of Barbados, and his mother, Geneva, is a native of St Lucia.

Stephen Wiltshire grew up in Little Venice, Maida Vale, London.

At the age of five, Stephen Wiltshire was sent to Queensmill School in London where he expressed interest in drawing.

When he was about seven, Stephen Wiltshire became fascinated with sketching landmark London buildings.

When he was ten, Stephen Wiltshire drew a sequence of drawings of London landmarks, one for each letter, that he called a "London Alphabet".

In 1987, Stephen Wiltshire was part of the BBC programme The Foolish Wise Ones.

Between 1995 and his graduation in 1998, Stephen Wiltshire attended the City and Guilds of London Art School in Kennington, Lambeth, South London.

Stephen Wiltshire can look at a subject once and then draw an accurate and detailed picture of it.

Stephen Wiltshire's nineteen-foot-long drawing of 305 square miles of New York City is based on a twenty-minute helicopter ride.

In 2003, a retrospective of his work, "Not a Camera: the Unique Vision of Stephen Wiltshire", was held in the Orleans House gallery in Twickenham, London.

In May 2005 Stephen Wiltshire produced his longest ever panoramic memory drawing of Tokyo on a 32.8-foot-long canvas within seven days following a helicopter ride over the city.

When Stephen Wiltshire took the helicopter ride over Rome, he drew it in such great detail that he drew the exact number of columns in the Pantheon.

In October 2009 Stephen Wiltshire completed the last work in the series of panoramas, an 18-foot memory drawing of his "spiritual home", New York City.

Stephen Wiltshire visited Bermuda National Gallery where the sale of his donated drawing of Hamilton raised over $22,000.

Stephen Wiltshire started a tour of China in September 2010, with a first project taking him to Shanghai.

In July 2014, Stephen Wiltshire drew an aerial panorama of the Singapore skyline from memory after a brief helicopter ride, taking five days to complete the 1 x 4m artwork.

Stephen Wiltshire's work has been the subject of many TV documentaries.

In 1989, Stephen Wiltshire appeared on the cover of You magazine with actor Dustin Hoffman, who had portrayed autistic savant Raymond Babbitt in the 1988 Oscar-winning film, Rain Man, which Stephen Wiltshire considers to be one of his favourite movies.

In 2006, Stephen Wiltshire was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to art.

In September 2006 Stephen Wiltshire opened his permanent gallery in the Royal Opera Arcade, Pall Mall, London.

In 2011, Stephen Wiltshire was made an honorary Fellow of the Society of Architectural Illustrators.

In January 2015, Stephen Wiltshire was made an honorary Fellow of The Scottish Society of Architect Artists.