Peter Coke was an actor, playwright and sometime sculptor who will be best remembered for his portrayal of Francis Durbridge's urbane radio detective, Paul Temple.

Although half a dozen actors had taken the part before him, he played it longer than anyone else, from 1954 until the final serial 14 years later, and for a generation of listeners his polished voice was inseparable from the character as he braved bombs and bullets to unmask the villain in the final episode.

Durbridge offered him the part on one condition, that he did not change a word of the script. Coke was by then a successful playwright and knew a thing or two about dialogue but was happy to agree. His only fear, as the programme went out live in the early days, was that his glasses would steam up at the wrong moment.

Peter Coke was born at Southsea, Hampshire, in 1913. He was a remarkably self-effacing member of the Coke family, whose antecedents included Sir Edward Coke, the eminent 17th-century Lord Chief Justice, and Coke of Holkham, the agricultural pioneer whose descendants, the Earls of Leicester, still live at Holkham Hall, Norfolk.

His early life was spent in Kenya, where his father, a naval officer who had once served on the Royal Yacht, became a coffee planter. From Kenya, Coke returned to England every term to be educated at Stowe. From Stowe he went to Menton, as an aide to the British vice-consul, after which, to his father’s horror, he won a scholarship to RADA and went into the theatre.

At the outbreak of war he was commissioned into the army and served at Tobruk, Salerno and Monte Cassino, where he was wounded and invalided out with the rank of captain. After the war he returned to the theatre, but, in spite of his continued success as an actor, he took to writing plays. Breath of Spring enjoyed a long run, both in the West End and on Broadway. It was followed by three other seasonal plays, Midsummer Mink, Autumn Manoeuvres, Winter Glory, and by further plays and television dramas.

By the end of the 1960s, however, he found himself increasingly engrossed in antique-dealing and opened Park Antiques at the far end of New Kings Road, Chelsea. He then embarked on a new career, turning seashells into decorative art. He scoured the beaches of the world for ever-rarer and more beautiful examples to incorporate into his work, reproducing with shells alone replicas of flowers, from the simplest snowdrop to the most exotic and complex flower arrangements. He expanded his talent and imagination to create entire gardens in miniature, palaces, pavilions and even a Tower of Babel, several feet high.

In his early eighties Coke mounted a series of exhibitions of his work in London, all of which were a huge success and earned him the sobriquet “the Fabergé of shell art”. His clients included members of the Royal Family, the Guggenheim Museum and numerous celebrities.

Having amassed a number of his works for his own private collection, he became increasingly anxious to bequeath them to the general public. The district council of Sheringham offered him a site in part of The Old Lifeboat House on the West Cliff where his work is on permanent exhibition.

Peter Coke, actor, playwright and sculptor, was born on April 3, 1913. He died on July 30, aged 95