Willow Tree Wood
As well as being responsible for the picture book output of the new imprint Willow Tree, I was the designer and artworker for our growing list of chapter fiction titles, aimed at emerging readers between five and nine. Willow Tree Wood was our first fully original series, written by an in-house writer.
After completing some thorough market research, both in-store and online, I created the idea for a series look constantly benchmarking against competitors. Then, using commissioned illustration, used my chosen fonts and layout to complete the covers, all adorned with foil detailing on the front and spine. Choosing internal illustrations to a set budget came next, before fully artworking each title, in both UK and USA versions.
I loved completing the insides and using the beautiful illustrations to completely furnish the spreads with cute and dainty decorations, as well as fun learning activities such as a quiz at the back of each book.
As well as creating the covers and deciding on which illustrations to commission, I also artworked the full insides of each title. Each book was one hundred and four pages long and I managed to create an array of decorative elements, including endpapers, contents page bordering, folio decorations, quiz pages and page breaks, all related to the season in which the story was set.
Cleverly, I was able to artwork each of the books throughout with little touches to replicate the changes of season in each story. For example, each starting chapter page had the same woodland scene on it and manipulating the illustrations enabled me to recreate the same scene during winter, spring, summer and autumn.
As part of my extensive market research, I discovered that not only do front covers play a big role in catching eyes on the shelves, but the spines are also important too. With this in mind, I created a front cover embellished with foil title graphics and detailing and then carried this onto the spine, to make sure the spines stood out when stacked on shop floor shelving.
