Illustrating a Children's Book

I illustrated The Yellow Tutu, written by Kirsten Bramsen, and published by Random House in 2009. For a peek into the process of illustrating a book, check out the following links. Each shows a double-page illustration as it appeared in the sequence of the book, accompanied by commentary and/or preliminary sketches:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Part 5
• Part 6
• Part 7
• Part 8
• Part 9
• Part 10
• Part 11
• Part 12
• Part 13
• Part 14
• Part 15
• Part 16

For further reading on illustrating children's books, I highly recommend Writing With Pictures, by Uri Shulevitz, and Illustrating Children's Books, by Martin Salisbury.

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Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 16

The last two pages show the girls bonding in a garden of their shared imagination. Text is on the upper left.

Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 15

Margo and Pearl engage no further with the bullies. They skip away, and plan their own pretend tea party.


The text here is all on the left page, on the tufted hill.

Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 14

Margo points out that she also looks like a lion. I tried to show her lion as powerful, but good-natured. Sure, she has commanding fangs, but she only uses them to smile. The worst revenge the teaser suffers is to have her braids undone by the roar.

Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 13

Pearl steps up for Margo. She knows a good fashion idea when she sees one, and shares Margo's penchant for similes. "I like Margo's yellow tutu and I think she looks just like a sunflower."


Margo's sunflower stands out in a field of look-alike daisies.

Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 12

Margo stands up bravely to the bullies and onlookers. I took the opportunity here to show our other heroine, Pearl, entering the scene from a distance. This way, she's clearly had no part in the shenanigans of the previous pages.

Illustrating The Yellow Tutu, Part 11

She gathers her forces, and gives herself a pep talk. The text here sounds cheerful, but I wanted to show the hurt and confusion Margo uses these words to fend off. It's not a breeze for our heroine to stand up to teasing, but she does it anyway. I made sure my sister, who wrote The Yellow Tutu, agreed with this, and our editor signed off.