EVENTS magazine and welovestornoway.com have a new editor. Award-winning island journalist Katie Laing has taken over from Phil Hardy.
Katie was a journalist at the Stornoway Gazette until recently and has an extensive background in newspapers and other journalistic activities.
She also writes independently on Substack about island news and the outdoors, and was previously an English teacher in the Nicolson Institute and at UHI North, West and Hebrides. She has also worked in teacher education and communications.
Katie’s first steps into journalism were in the 1990s when she did work experience at the Stornoway Gazette during her holidays home from university.
Fred Silver – founder of EVENTS and welovestornoway.com – was editor of the Gazette at the time.
Katie has an MA Honours degree in English Literature and Language from Glasgow University and a PGCE secondary teaching qualification from Jordanhill.
Her first official job in newspapers came in 1998, when she began at the West Highland Free Press in Skye as a trainee reporter.
From there, she went on to the first of her two stints at the Stornoway Gazette, alongside colleagues including Donnie ‘Gazette’ MacInnes. Her second stint at the Gazette, overseen by editor-at-large Brian Wilson, was from September 2024 to July this year.
Katie worked at various newspapers in Glasgow from 2001 to 2009. She was a news reporter at the Evening Times – a busy city newspaper with three editions a day – for four years and a sub-editor at the Daily Record for another four years.
Katie returned to Lewis in 2009 and is married with two sons. She is the daughter of retired GP Dr John Smith and wife Muriel, and married to Jason.
In her free time, Katie enjoys time outdoors and is one of the leaders of the new Run Talk Run Stornoway group.
Katie said: “I am delighted to be stepping into the role of editor of EVENTS and welovestornoway, and pleased to be working with an excellent team here at Intermedia Services.
“Thank you to Fred for giving me this opportunity, which is exciting and challenging, and a responsibility I don’t take lightly.
“This is a news organisation that is entirely free from political bias, propaganda or the influence of any vested interests.
“We will continue to report the news, without fear or favour, to the very best of our ability. We aim to bring quality news to the readers as quickly as possible – whether that is hard news, human interest, sport or practical community information.
“Our mission is to serve our community of island readers.”
Katie works alongside fellow journalist Cara Macdonald and a former Gazette colleague, Thomas Taylor Edgar, contributing to the news output from Hanoi, Vietnam.
You can contact Katie by emailing
