Many of our fabulous Plum artists took part in a range of activities from butterfly crafts, to storyboards, character design and plenty of costumes!
Júlia Moscardo and Joseph Namara Hollis
Júlia Moscardo and Joseph Namara Hollis’s World Book Day involved similarly brilliant costumes, as they shared their books’ Changing Tides’, ‘Home of the Wild’, and ‘Pierre’s New Hair’, ‘Not in the Mood’ at a local primary school. Joe presented ‘How to Make Books’ teaching the older children a little about the process, and Júlia shared further details on ‘Making Book Covers’. The children were incredibly enthusiastic, curious and full of unexpected questions as they put their newly found knowledge into action designing their own illustrations to reimagine the final chapter in their class book.
Jonny Lambert
Jo Lindley
Jo Lindley visited children in years 3 and 4, and together they explored anthropomorphism. The children discovered how illustrators use facial expressions, body language and accessories to give human qualities to animals, objects and even shapes.
They used a variety of examples, from Paddington Bear, and Bluey to The Lion King, to identify emotions and personalities. Jo was so impressed by the creativity in the room, with children dreaming up characters ranging from superhero burgers to ballerina cuppas!
Holly Swain
After the smashing successes of Colin's Castle and Colin's Grandma, Holly and publisher Farshore are coming together once more to bring you a brand new Colin adventure... Colin's Monster is headed to bookshelves near you in August 2026!
We hope the exciting World Book Day festivities continue all year round in this National Year of Reading, and look forward to plenty of costumes and crafts again next year!
After a busy morning, Joe and Júlia spent the afternoon reading books to the children at a local nursery, and developing some fun animal characters together with the class.
Reflecting on the excitement of the day, Joe commented:
“It was a truly uplifting day out, such a treat to see how all the staff had made great efforts to make World Book Day a real treat for everyone involved.”
The fantastic Jonny Lambert had an action packed day starting with a costume parade in the playground of a huge variety of exciting book characters. All these characters then took part in a butterfly craft, creating their own butterflies and fluttering these in time with the book as Jonny ended each class session reading about Buttons the dog chasing his own butterfly in ‘As the World Goes By’. After signing over 200 books, the students were delighted to take these straight home to continue sharing the stories with their families.
Working together the class designed their own anthropomorphised ‘goodie’ and ‘baddie’ characters, before collaborating on an original story. The children had a wonderful time learning that great storytelling can simply start with a fun and silly character.
Over in Worcester children enjoyed a story which indeed began as a very funny vampire, as they listened to ‘Colin’s Grandma’ read by Holly Swain. Colin’s castle is a firm favourite among children across the country, with schools in Redhill voting Colin as their favourite character, and Colin’s castle as their favourite book in the Redhill Trust Book Awards 2026.
