Wednesday 25 November 2015

Picture books with beautiful illustrations

We still read picture books, not exclusively but mixed in with chapter books. Now that the younger children are nine and six, the books tend to be more complex but we care more, rather than less about the illustrations. This is a personal list of picture books with beautiful artwork. 

The first few are books that my children have really grown out of but were firm favourites and the latter books are those that we have read since they have been older.


Peepbo by Allan and Janet Ahlberg is set in the 1940s and has detailed domestic interiors. Lovely rhyming text.


The Alfie series by Shirley Hughes again has detailed pictures of homes, in London.


Beatrix Potter's books are a pleasure from her wonderful vocabulary to the delicate watercolours.


John Goodall painted some wordless books. Edwardian Christmas is seasonal. Another favourite is Story of an English Village.


Also in the topical vein is Susan Jeffers' illustrated version of Robert Frost's poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy evening. This came out for our poetry tea, this week, and will probably make several appearances in December!


Recently, we have found, via the Veritas self paced literature list, Aliki's book Medieval Feast. One of my readers has told me of more titles which are on our list!



Another find, from the Veritas list, is St George and the Dragon by Margaret Hodges. This is a Caldecott award winner and justifiably so.


We have been enjoying David Macaulay's books Castle and Cathedral, this term with his detailed technical drawings. His The way things work is also frequently off the shelves.


Marcia Williams produces historically related picture books. This picture is from the book about the First World War. We have found several of her books in our local library.


Have you favourite picture books with beautiful illustrations? I'm always interested to find out about different titles!

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11 comments:

  1. A couple of ones we have and really like in your post. Another one, which is possibly my favourite illustrated book I've discovered as an adult, is The Mousehole Cat by Antonia Barber and illustrated wonderfully by Nicola Bayley. And probably my favourite illustrated book from childhood is Mr Gumpy's Outing by Nick Burningham. Thanks for this post - a chance to delve into my memories of wonderful illustrations!

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    1. Thank you, Helen. We like Mr Gumpy too and must look out for the Mousehole Cat.

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  2. I like Jan Brett's illustrations. I might have to go through some of our books and see what I find.

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    1. I've just looked at a list of Jan Brett's books and don't think I have seen any. I will look out for some.

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  3. We've enjoyed a few Marcia William's books - Shakespeare & Dickens retellings & Greek Myths but I haven't seen the one you posted. I've bought a couple of picture books for my 22 yr old dd for Christmas. She uses them in very creatively in teaching her Grade 6 class.

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    1. Carol, that is interesting about your daughter using picture books with older children. I use picture books with a mixed age group,at our home education group, and they always go down well.

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  4. I'm are very partial to picture books; I developed a love of them during my children's early childhood years, and my teen daughter & I collect them
    Thanks for sharing some of your favourite illustrators - the only illustrator I'm not familiar with is Margaret Hodges.
    (I have a developing pinterest to archive my most favourite picture books :) )

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    1. We also like the Alfie books :-) We like Kim Lewis' books, such as 'Floss', and 'Little Red Train to the Rescue' and other books by Benedict Blathwayt.

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    2. Chelle, what a lovely thing to collect. I would like to follow your Pinterest board. Please let me have the link.

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    3. Gwen, how could I have forgotten Floss? We love this book, too, and the Shepherd Boy is also popular here.

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  5. We think it's a wonderful thing to collect :)

    Often a pinterest link doesn't seem to transfer over into being able to open it directly online
    https://www.pinterest.com/sldownunderg/picture-books-~-favourites/

    (& sorry, not trying to self promote here at all! I'll include a blog link which will take you to the picture books pinterest, if the above link doesn't behave
    http://www.last-in-line.info/2015/10/picture-books-few-visuals-and-links.html )

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