Christmas occasions a nearly bottomless supply of images and lore. We collect it avidly. This is a drawer of Christmas ephemera. We also have drawers on Santa Claus, Christmas greeting cards and Christmas postcards. Further, we have hundreds of books picturing Christmas. Just now we are using these resources to create Christmas books, cards and stickers for the coming holiday season.
Congratulations to our author, Alexandra Day! The first two of her books for beginning readers have made the Bank Street College of Education's Best Children's Books of the Year, 2012.
Chev, our art director, has discovered that the dogs find canned air incredibly exciting, so when we need a little comic relief, we get it out and watch the dogs go crazy. Cleo, the Irish terrier, does not think it's so funny, but Zulaica (aka Carl) loves it. You can see that Chev hasn't even aimed it at him yet but he knows what's coming. If we had sound, you could hear him. He's a big dog and it's loud.
We have never used a game board in a publishing project, but we nevertheless have many beautiful examples in our collection. They tend to graphic boldness, which inspires our designers. In our dream headquarters we will have a room decorated with colorful game boards.
Our library has hundreds of feet of book shelving, and we busy ourselves in searching them for memorable images to share with the public in our products. Naturally we need bookends, and while many are in use, there are many that are acting as adornments while they wait their turn to be used.
One of my favorite illustrators is Gladys Peto. Unfortunately we don't have a lot of products featuring this illustrator's work. Her very stylized figures are a little difficult to work into our product line. In fact, it's become a bit of a joke that I will bring up Gladys Peto at every product meeting. But I'm going to keep trying!
Since Alexandra Day's new book, The Fairy Dogfather, has a magical protagonist who wasn't around to pose for her, she had to call on Carl to do a little modeling for her. Carl is a very willing poser, and was happy to help. Here's a picture of him showing her what a hat on a dog looks like.
The illustrator Charlotte Becker excelled at depicting adorable babies and children in a sentimental style.
To wind up, for now, our state travel decals we come home to Washington and this very fine salmon.
Today we're sharing an image from the Southwestern United States. Enjoy!