Mr Wilkes Saves the Day

Last week was really hectic. As well as my two sessions at the university, I also travelled to Huddersfield to talk the Youth Libraries Group, then on Friday I was out again, taking the train to Lichfield in Staffs, to spend the day at Highfields Primary School in Burntwood. 

The children had ordered 60 signed books, way too many to carry, so I had to post them and the parcel exceeded the maximum postal weight! Since big book orders are always the sign of a proactive school, I had high hopes for the visit.

They didn't disappoint: what a great school. It had a really happy feel about it. The children were so excited. I met all KS1 first, for a mega storytelling, then all KS2, for one of my PowerPoint talks about how books are created from scratch.

At lunchtime I scoffed a jacket potato in the staff room, then set to signing yet more books for all the teachers for Christmas presents. It was probably the most fun and friendly staff room I've been in. What a very silly bunch. I threatened to blog the things they were talking about but most of the banter would be unrepeatable here!

In advance of my visit, Mrs Morris the Literacy Coordinator, had organised a big reading challenge for the whole school. The classes were battling it out to see who could read the most by the time of my visit and the prize was to have an extra session with me in the afternoon.

The winners in KS1 were Class 2, so we had a fun hour together reading Bears on the Stairs and designing monsters. It was a dead heat between 2 classes in KS2. I don't normally do workshops for more than one class at a time, but we broke the rule and I worked with all 60 children together in the hall, showing them how to create animal characters and how to make them run across the paper.

I forgot to pre-order my taxi back to Lichfield Station, half an hour's drive away. The trains were only one an hour and the journey takes nearly 2 hours, so at 3.15pm, when we discovered there were no taxis to be had for another 45 minutes, I was desperate. Step in Mr Wilkes, the Head (yes, that's him on the left), who chivalrously dropped everything and whisked me safely to the station in his car. What a hero! 


As you can see, the long journey each way meant lots of time for drawing. Hope you like them. I was especially pleased with Leopard-skin Coat Woman.

Children's Illustration Competition: Winners...

Remember the children's illustrations that were created as a response to my exhibition? Children were asked to create there own picture book character, inspired by the show.

Well, after much deliberation, I am finally ready to announce the winners (drum roll.....)

First Prize goes to Eloise (who is just 4 years old!) for Rose the Monster Princess:

I really like all the details, especially the pink hairspray and the green, slimy hand-prints on her pink dress from her green slimy hands. I think a monster princess is a fabulous idea and a great character for a story.

Second prize goes to Emmy for the Purple-Lipped Snapper Firetail:

What a great character and so unusual. I like the colours: the blending to create the fire and the red sky with the green sun, which makes it look like he might live on an alien planet. Oh, and I especially like his panicky face.  

Runners up are Sofia for Roo in a Shoe (don't you just love those trendy pumps?):

...and Emily for Gemma the Short-Necked Giraffe:

...and Athena for Gerald the Camel:

You can see all the entries on the Salford Gallery's Flickr site.

Unfortunately, my Salford exhibition has now come down but, if you are interested in children's illustration, I'm sure you will enjoy Picture This! Illustrating Children's Books, which has just opened in Gallery Oldham, and is on until March 11th.

TADO at Hallam University

This week, I started a short block of Illustration lecturing at the local Sheffield Hallam University. I'm doing just 4 hours each week until mid Jan: there isn't time to do it as a regular thing, but now and then it's fun and adds variety to life. This time last year I taught life drawing for a few weeks and also worked with last year's 3rd years, helping them develop their Final Projects. 

This time I'm with 2nd years. My first session was on Wednesday, but there was a one-off talk by the Sheffield-based illustrators 'TADO' scheduled during my session time, so I had a very easy morning, sitting with the students, listening to TADO talk about their work (and sketching, of course).

TADO are in fact Katie and Mike (above), a couple who met at art school 10 year ago. 

Since then, they have had meteoric success and work with various massive companies all over the world. Their frenetic scenes and offbeat characterisations have been applied to everything from Orange ad campaigns, flip-flops, Gola bags, toys...

They are in fact obsessed with toys and this is their illustration of themselves at play.

To be honest, their work is not really my bag, but it is extremely well done and they work unbelievably hard. One big job had them both busy grafting all day and half the night, 7 days a week, for several months. They were barely out of the house, apart for mercy-dashes for food, and their neighbour thought they had gone away on a long holiday!

I had a lecturing slot at Hallam on Thursday morning too, when I had a proper session with real teaching. The students are beginning a new project based on the Cultural Olympiad music event Alight, so my role was to try and help them remove the creative brick wall that you get when panic sets in and to suggest ways they might unlock their ideas.  

The university is only 10 minutes on the bus (perfect or what?) and, on my way home on Wednesday, I spent most of that time sketching this man (quite a feat, as it was extremely bumpy):

He smiled at me, so I showed him the drawing and we chatted until he had to get off, just the stop before me. He emailed me when he got in: turns out he works in web design for Sheffield Council: hello Toks!

Pitching Children's Stories to Publishers

Remember the dog story idea? Well, I took it down to London last Friday and showed my sketch sheets to a couple of my editors. It's always a wee bit scary, pitching a project that you think is really fun, and hoping that other people think so too.

On the train down, I did my usual people-sketching, which takes so much concentration that it is a great way to take your mind off thinking too much about how things are going to go.

I enjoy going down to London. It's 20 years since I lived there and a great many things have changed, but in some ways it still feels the same and I feel very at home travelling about. I do like the buzz of the frenetic activity that is going on everywhere; I even enjoy the craziness of the tube, but these days that mad buzz is more fun as a visitor than if I had to live there every day.

It turned out to be a really positive day. I read my story aloud to give it as much life as possible, I even did all the voices! One publisher in particular was very interested (hurrah!). 

She liked the unusual idea behind the story (which I can't divulge of course, at this stage) and she loved the humour. There is a little bit of extra work to be done before she takes it to meetings, to try and sell the idea to the rest of the team: I have to add in an extra section, involving some cats.

I'm really looking forward to getting stuck into that, but I still have so much else on at the moment that I haven't had a moment. 

Anyway, once all the important stuff was done, I just had time for a quick culture-fix: an hour's whip round Tate Britain, before I had to head back to St Pancras for my train home. 

I enjoyed my sketching again on the way back, as you can see. Definitely a very positive day (thank goodness!).

Bear in Tights!

I had another of my nice surprises through the letterbox this morning: a lovely, hand-drawn card from the children at St John's School where I spent the day doing a storytelling and illustration workshop with the children earlier this month. 

I love their illustration of a bear in a crop-top, rainbow skirt and black tights:

Thank you too, St John's - what a nice thought. I'm so glad you enjoyed our day together: me too!

NCBF: A Whirlwind of Storytelling!

On Sunday afternoon, just over a week ago, I packed a suitcase and a sketchbook, then hopped on a train to Newcastle, where I was staying right through until Wednesday afternoon, doing loads of storytelling for the Northern Children's Book Festival.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to do any drawing on the way: the train was full of drunken football supporters, so I thought it wiser not to draw attention to myself!! Not to worry: there were other sketching opportunities during the festival, as you can see.

I have done the NCBF many times before: it's one of my favourites. I love spending 3 days steeped in stories; I love all the excited children I meet; I love (and am in awe of) the extraordinary way librarians transport loads of authors and illustrators to vast numbers of children, all over North East of England.

This year, instead of staying in a hotel, I was put up by Ann Key, ex chair of the NCBF. She gave me a bed, cooked me lovely dinners (with home-baked cakes!) and kept me company in the evenings when I got in from my events. We had loads in common, so it was a real treat. Mind you, most nights I was so tired I was asleep by 10pm.

Each morning, bright and early, I travelled to a different part of the region to read my 3 latest books: Dragon's Dinner, Stinky! and Bears on the Stairs. 

On Monday it was N. Tyneside, where I was looked after by Lesley. We had a great day: I saw 180 children from 3 different schools. Between them they bought 135 books (!), so many, there wasn't time to sign them all on the spot (not drawing a picture too), so I took them back with me and was still signing at 7pm.

Lesley remembered from last time I was there, how much I love the sea so, after the last event of the day, we wrapped up warm and went for a walk along the front. The tide was in and the waves were really crashing down - fantastic!

On Tuesday, Ann drove me to Hexham, where I changed cars, then Kim drove me way up into the wilds of northern Northumberland, where are there are lots of small rural schools, who clubbed together for my sessions. The best of all was Kielder First School, with just 10 pupils in total - that's the whole school! They were lovely (hello guys). 


Kim and I had a gorgeous pub lunch at half time in the pretty, historic village of Bellingham (mushroom madras - yum yum). I probably had garlic breath all afternoon (sorry kids!).

Wednesday was a very early start - I was up at 6am. I had to pack up my suitcase then at 7am Ann drove me to Newcastle station where I caught a train to Middlesborough for the day. Because I was drawing the people, I noticed how at 7.30am the train was full of men, who all got off at Hartlepool for work, which was where at 8.15am, it re-filled with women.

I had a fun time in Berwick Hills Library in the morning, then again in Acklam Library in the afternoon, meeting 170 children in three 1hr sessions.

The end of the day was a crazy rush though: the children didn't arrive until quite late, so we got a little behind. It was my own fault - I should have finished earlier, as I had a huge pile of books to sign.  I didn't have time to sign them all properly, as I had a taxi waiting at the library door to take me to Darlington to catch a train home. I just managed to draw a little picture in each book before I literally ran from the library, coat under one arm, suitcase in the other!

We made it in time (phew) and I was able to catch my breath once I was safely underway. Luckily this time the train was full but peaceful, and I was able to get my sketchbook out and draw all the way home.

Thanks to everyone who looked after me, drove me around, humped flipcharts and big boxes of heavy books back and forth, took me to lunch etc and especially a huge thank you to Ann Key for her wonderful hospitality!   

Baby Can Bounce: the Cover is Sorted

Sarah, my designer at Egmont, has finished the cover design for my new book. The stripy text I prepared and scanned is all done and in place, the baby croc has his pants on (!) the new strap-line is in place (although that still might change: we're not sure if it's too educational sounding) and the colour is... 

...yep: yellow. 

This is quite funny. Though I was the one who stuck out for yellow originally, when the guys at Egmont wanted lilac (because I thought it would work better with the green croc), I changed my mind when I saw the lilac mocked up. Typical then, that the consensus at Egmont should now change to liking the yellow. It's especially ironic, given that I had to change the cover of Baby Goes Baaaaa!, which I conceived as yellow from the start, to a duck-egg blue. Hey ho. 

If you want to read about how the cover was designed from my scratch, take a look at my initial sketches.

Publication for Baby Goes Baaaaa! is April, which will be here in no time. Baby Can Bounce! is following close on it's heels, in early summer.

Children's Illustration Competition

While I was having breakfast the other day, a massive parcel arrived. Inside were various things coming back to me from my big exhibition, which came down last week. Not the framed artwork though - that's all going into storage at Tameside Gallery, ready for another airing, planned for the not too distant future, but all the roughs and sketchbooks have come back to me.

Also in the parcel, was a pack of entries to my children's illustration competition: 

Visitors to the exhibition were asked to design their own picture-book character, inspired by my show. We had over 32,000 visitors in the 3 months the show was up, so there were an awful lot of entries. Since not everyone could win a prize, I painted 4 picture frames onto the gallery walls, at child height, so the children's work could be displayed alongside mine, and gallery staff kept putting up the best entries, as a changing display:

The guys at the gallery also helped me enormously by shortlisting the entries down to the top 50 (quite a task I should think) and it was these 50 drawings that I got in my package. They were all so lovely and all so different, with ages spanning from 3 years old through to 12. How on earth to chose!?!

I have whittled the 50 down to my top 10, but can only chose 5 winners. SO hard. I am still musing... Watch this space!

Up to My Armpits in Red Stripes!

A messy morning last week! I had to clear my desk and put all my story sketch sheets well out of harm's way, to quickly do another funny little bit of artwork to patch into the cover of my latest book Baby Can Bounce!. 

Those who have been popping in regularly, will know that this is the sequel to Baby Goes Baaaaa! (due out in April next year). To give things a softer, more cuddly feel, Sarah, my designer at Egmont, suggested I created a cute, spotty texture for the main title text of that book, by hand drawing spots in pastels, to match the pattern on the lamb's romper suit:

We want the typography on book 2 to have a similar feel, but be slightly different, so stripes seemed like a good idea, to match the little stripy swimsuit the crocodile wears. 


The worst job was measuring and drawing all the stripe guidelines, in fine pencil. Then I just had to colour in a block of pattern: the actual letters will be created later, by a sort of digital-collage process.

Just like when I created the emergency crocodile pants, I scanned the stripe artwork here in the studio, then emailed it straight to Sarah, so she could create the stripy letters at her end. Here's how the title looks with it's new stripes:

It's been all very ASAP, as Egmont are creating a quick version of the cover of Baby Can Bounce! in advance of the rest of the book, so they can pop a little pic of it into the back of Baby Goes Baaaaa!, which is going off to the printers for proofing any minute now.

Book Illustration Videos: I'm on YouTube with Shoo Raynor!

Remember our ill-fated trip to North Wales? Well, one thing that helped take our minds off our problems was the pleasure of spending time with Shoo Rayner, who was doing the same festival as me, and so staying at the same hotel as us for the 3 nights. 

It was lovely to have breakfast and dinner together every day and chew the fat (though not literally I hasten to add - the food at the manorhaus is gorgeous). It's so rare to get real time with fellow authors and illustrators, we always have fun comparing notes (comparing 'horror stories' from dodgy school visits is also a fave!).

Shoo is very into creating exciting ideas for the web at the moment, and has for some time been making little films about how he draws. His latest project though is to create filmed interviews with other illustrators and authors he meets on the road. So, while we were together in Ruthin, he asked me if I would mind doing an interview. What fun!

The hotel let us use their restaurant one afternoon after our library events were over. Shoo set up a tripod and I collected all the bits and bobs I had with me for my talks with the children. Then we just chatted about them. All very relaxed. I drew Stinky! on camera which turned out really well (phew!) NB Don't be put off by the fact that this film starts with the same intro as above - it changes:

At the end we did a signed-book swap on camera - a nice touch.
Unfortunately we made one boo-boo: when we were shooting close-ups of my sketchbooks to edit into the interview, Shoo mistakenly turned the camera off when he thought he was turning it on, so we didn't get those.