Whitley illustrator brings new children’s book to life

A local illustrator has contributed her creative talents to a new children’s book that introduces young readers to the days of the week and different weather types.

Catherine Graham, an illustrator from Whitley, collaborated on the book Frostily Dostily Day, written by Keynsham-based author Kip Ringham. 

“Kip came to me with the idea all worked out on his part,” says Catherine, who says she has been drawing since she was in primary school and received her first paid commissions in 2020. “He had written the text for the book and had an idea of what he wanted the characters to look like. I created some character concepts for him of the boy, the dog and also the boy’s mother who appears occasionally throughout.

“Once we narrowed down character appearances, Kip wrote out descriptions of each page illustration, including what each character would be doing, their expressions, the setting and the weather types. I worked through one at a time and we refined each image through its progress with regular check-ins. We had the brilliant help and support of writer and publisher Paul Wennersberg-Løvholen, who helped us with book formatting.”

Catherine, who moved to Melksham in 2007, studied illustration at the University of the West of England in Bristol and has said that any local young people who may be interested in illustration should join local creative groups, or connect with artists on social media, and draw as much as possible.

“For any younger, or even older people, looking to do illustration, I would say that connecting with other creative people is really important and going along to drawing classes.

“These days there is quite a big artist presence on social media, so you can post your art to something image-based like Instagram and you can connect with other people that way.”

“It was a great journey working on the book and I felt that Kip was open to new ideas while also having a clear vision of what he wanted to do, which is very helpful! We hope to work together again in the future for a second book Kip is developing.”