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Look, my Jampires co-author David O'Connell and I have been out on a heist mission!



The Discover Children's Story Centre in Stratford, northeast London, has a fabulous new exhibition designed by writer-illustrator team Andy Briggs and Peter Mac called SECRET AGENTS. I've always loved London's Cabinet War Rooms, and they've captured a whiff of that sort of atmosphere. And unlike the Cabinet War Rooms, you're allowed to run around and play and dress up and generally muck about.




Today our mission was to bring a drop-in comics workshop - Codename: Comic Maker - to the exhibition. Here was our team of agents: mission mastermind Agent David O'Connell with Gary Northfield, Alex Milway, and yours truly.



Here's Agent O'Connell handling a classic Matrix phonebox situation.



Oh no, I think the evil agents have discovered us, and the phone's not working! RUN, DAVE!



There's all sorts of fabulous stuff to explore, conveniently at kid height. Like this picture safe in the wall. Tip: you can also climb through the fireplace.



We had such gorgeous weather that we relocated outdoors, and then had our pens at the ready! I should add, I also had a There's a Shark in the Bath event, which is why my Secret Agent outfit has a tentacular twist.



Our team drew all sorts of things to order. Here's Dave taking on a Vampire Giraffe. Dave's a great friend and the writer-illustrator of the popular Monster and Chips books, and we have a book coming out together this autumn, called Jampires. (Exciting!)



And we did some Comics Jams, passing the comic around the table so everyone could draw a panel.



Some of the Comics Jams got quite dark and disturbing.



Very dark, indeed.



To lighten things up a bit, here's Alex Milway with his book Pigsticks and Harold, which comes out in May. It has pictures, some comic elements, and very jolly animals. I'm definitely going to get this book for kid friends who love stories but aren't so sure about tackling pages with lots of text.



Here's a result of one of Alex's Drawing Challenges:



Making comics in the sun with my excellent studio mate Gary Northfield (creator of Gary's Garden in The Phoenix Comic and wonderful book The Terrible Tale of the Teenytinysaurs). (Photo by Ben Stephens.)



Dave and I both took the challenge to draw a Vampire Giraffe, and this kid copied them so expertly; they actually looked better in his drawing.



The Discover centre had been lucky enough the previous day to host comic artists Laura Ellen Anderson, Jamie Littler and Richy K Chandler, awesome. Thre's so much fun built right into it. I'm always checking out the magic mirrors. Here's are stretched and squashed Ben Stephens and Discover's Racheal Brasier:



Oh my goodness, and SUCH a cool thing: I thought they'd chucked out all the stuff I'd designed for the Monsterville exhibition, but I spotted this sign over the toilets! I love it that the men's side is 'Beauty'.



And this cupboard room is being put to MUCH better use now:



Before I did my Shark stage event, I did some vocal exercises with my lovely Scholastic publicist, David Sanger:



Big thanks to everyone who came along and drew sharks with me! I got to see some wonderful sharks with loads of personality.





And comics! A few kids really got stuck in making them; it was wonderful to see. This girl used themes from the exhibition as inspiration.



Adam, who was running the tech stuff for my Shark event came with a very appropriate tattoo. Not a shark, but I give him a 9.5 for sharkish effort.



After my event, CBeebies presenter-turned-picture-book-writer Cerrie Burnell led another story session, and it was great to meet her.



Hey look, it's illustrator Guy Parker-Rees! He had been doing a Giraffes Can't Dance event upstairs. Giraffes somehow became a bit of an overall theme for the day.



Big thanks to the Discover team, Dave (for organising the whole Comic Maker part of the day), Gary and Alex on the comics team, and David Sanger for looking after me. If you haven't visited the exhibition yet, it runs until 31 August; details on their website.

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So did everyone watch the Olympic Opening Ceremony the other night? When I first saw the fields of hobbit-y, happy farmers, I thought, uh, oh. Like my writer friend Candy Gourlay said in an article on Rappler, she thought it might be painfully twee (definition of 'twee' for non-Brits). But then it all kicked off, and there were huge industrial smoke stacks, and Kenneth Branagh reciting Caliban's lines from The Tempest, Mr Bean's brilliantly stupid musical number, hundreds of Mary Poppinses, beautiful bicycle-driven giant doves... it got more and more exciting and, well, I was hugely taken with the whole thing. It had cheesy moments, but they didn't stop it from being an absolutely amazing spectacle. I bet it will spark off countless cartoons, but here's another great one of the Queen's parachute jump with Mr Bond, by Alex Paterson:



Lots going on around here this summer! Are you going to Caption Comics Festival? It's in Oxford on the weekend of 18-19 August, and it's a wonderful place to meet comic creators and find out more about comics. It's one of the very first comics events I ever went to and where I decided that small press comics are definitely something I'm very interested in. Here's a comic I made about Caption my first year, and if you follow this tag, you can see my reports from years past. And I've designed the t-shirt this year! Go ahead and buy one, whether you're going or not. But I hope you can come!



And to back up that small press interest, here's a comic to which I've recently contributed six colour pages. My copy of ink+PAPER, Issue 2 just arrived this morning! It's looking FABULOUS. You can order a copy here! Be sure to browse the lovely website created by its editor, David O'Connell.



So while I certainly wouldn't call myself a sportswoman in any way, I've had my own little role in the Olympics this week, with StoryCloud over at the Discover Children's Story Centre in Stratford. And I got called into give an interview about it on the Breakfast Show on the Olympics site with BBC London radio, how exciting! I'd stayed up very late watching the Opening Ceremony, so the early morning start was a bit hard-going. But I was surprised by how many sport fans were already on the rail station platform, and how wildly jubilant they all were. It all got incredibly silly. At 7 IN THE MORNING.




I met up with Racheal Brasier from Discover, and we

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Is London on target for the Olympics? Well, the Discover Children's Story Centre is! Lying in the shadow of the Olympic Park, they've set up a whole programme of interactive storytelling, called StoryCloud, as part of the London 2012 Festival cultural olympiad, open to kids everywhere to add their drawing and writing online!



So on Saturday, I threw on my sports gear and raced down to Olympicsland to do my bit. For London. FOR THE WORLD.



So while writer and my project colleague Philip Ardagh welcomed visiting dignitaries (what is a dignitary?), celebrities and heads of state, I led a big pack of excited kids in the Discover centre in bout of Down the Plughole-themed storytelling.



Since so much of StoryCloud is an online storytelling experience, I thought I'd use some of the bits and bobs I'd come up with, which hadn't been used for the interactive illustration, to create a sort of primitive slideshow animation. There was one little boy in the front, in an orange t-shirt, who went into absolute laughing hysterics when our character, Morris, got a sponge squeezed over his head, which was most heartening. Anyway, here's a rough approximation of what we did, although it was me reading, not Philip. (Hear Philip read the whole story, karaoke-style, over on the website, storycloud.co.uk.)



Then we thought about the kinds of things Morris might encounter down the plughole, and the kids helped me design a 'Sewergator'. Isn't it charming?




They also helped me come up with a comic, which made perfect sense on the day, but now seems slightly fragmented. Drawing comics to order in front of lots of people is a challenging past-time.



Then the kids came up with their own ideas about the things Morris would encounter down there. I might create my own fan art for this image by one kid, it's great.



It really was all happening that day, here's the Olympic Torch procession passing the Discover centre just minutes before our event.



...And would you look at that! Ha ha, I got to carry the torch for a whole 23 seconds. (Yes I did, of course I did.)



And then Stuart and I went for a wander around the Olympic Park, to inspect.



We didn't get to go up Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond's Olympic tower, but we'd quite like to.



The view from the skybridge inside Westfield:



And hey, cool artwork in next-door Stratford tube station. Love the 'taches!



A few more sewer be

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Today's morning sketch results from a scary mental picture after Philip Ardagh announced on Twitter that 'they' are bringing out a smaller version of him in the autumn. Who are 'they'? Do I want to know the answer to this?



Oh, and I'm doing an event based on my Olympiad StoryCloud tale with the larger of the two Ardaghs, Down The Plughole (and yes, go look!), but don't worry, HE WON'T BE THERE. 2:30, this Saturday, in the shadow of the Olympic stadium at the Discover Children's Story Centre, details here. Lots of drawing fun, without a lot less terror.



Did you twig that when Ardagh gulps HELP! in Down the Plughole, he sounds just like Jim Henson in Time Piece?



Yesterday was Cleaning Day at the Fleece Station studio, and today we make a last effort to tackle The Cupboard of Doom. Here are my lovely studio mates and Molly the dog, at Deptford Market, where we regularly get fleeced.

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Today you can see the interactive story I made for the Cultural Olympiad with Philip Ardagh! It's called Down the Plughole and stars a little boy named Morris who goes just there.



Philip reads the story and you can read along, karaoke-style, then you can have clicky-click fun all over my intereactive illustration (there's a 'Pull Me' sign! and a bare bum!), then go on and finish the story yourself, for the Discover Children's Story Centre's web gallery. Go on, try it!




Here's the video the Discover team shot in their offices. I mention a bathtub that doesn't actually appear in my illustration, and that's because Philip and I were the guinea pigs; we went first and tried out a few things before Neal Hoskins and his team at Winged Chariot Press settled on the format they used for all the stories.



Here are a few outtakes from the bathtub scene. You could click on soap and a sponge and Morris himself to make things happen in the bath. The one with the green bubbles would've had a kickin' sound effect, but I'll have to save that for later. :)



Check out the other amazing illustrations! Go to the website now, scroll down under 'More Stories', and you can click all over them and make things happen. Here's David Roberts' picture for David Almond's story:



Chris Riddell illustrated a text by Malorie Blackman:



Adam Stower illustrating Andy Stanton's:



Kristyna Litten illustrating Michael Rosen's:



There's more on the way! The Discover centre is releasing a NEW STORY every Monday! And here's a photo from the launch party, with collaborators Elissa Elwick, Candy Gourlay, Adam Stower, Kristyna Litten and Chris Riddell. Click here for more fun photos of that day!



And are YOU and your family going to take part in this year's SUMMER READING CHALLENGE? Get down to your local library, there's great stuff laid on for you! Find out more about the Summer Reading Challenge 2012 here.

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Remember that MONSTERVILLE I mentioned in earlier blog posts, the monster village I designed with Ed Vere, Neal Layton and the Discover Children's Story Centre in Stratford, east London? Well, this time the Discover gang paired me up with very tall writer Philip Ardagh, and we came up with a little interactive web story. And so did lots of other fab writers and illustrators whose work you'll probably recognise! So today was the official launch day of the StoryCloud website; the Discover centre threw a party, and the 'pull me' lever got pulled.



I wasn't quite sure who was coming to the party, other than Mr Ardagh, so I was chuffed to bits when I arrived to see him, Chris Riddell and Adam Stower already there, and I met StoryCloud illutrator Carl Pearce. We were all curious to see how our stories had turned out, and poked and prodded the iPad like excited 3-year-olds.



And here's the new StoryCloud website! You'll only get to read the first story on this visit, but Discover will unlock a new story every Monday for eleven more weeks. The first one's by former children's laureate and writer Michael Rosen and illustrator Kristyna Litten. You can read a bit more about it in today's Telegraph article by Martin Chilton here.





Current children's laureate Julia Donaldson (you know, The Gruffalo and all that) gave an opening speech to start us off.



Mr Ardagh read his short story, Down the Plug Hole and I made a little picture of what was supposed to be our character, a small boy named Morris, in the bath, but which turned out to be someone else. Then the audience helped me fill up the bath with an eagle, an snake, an elephant...



Here's Malorie Blackman reading her story, Strange Things Happen while Chris Riddell draws a pegasus.



And Adam Stower did a great presentation, giving us important lessons about things one should and shouldn't stick up one's nose. You can catch a glimpse at the page Adam drew, in the background, put together by Neal Hoskins and his small team at Winged Chariot press. We had a good laugh about those pink things in the bottles which are, in fact, lungs. It's a lung shop.



One cool thing was that they mixed a few young storytellers in with the pros; here are two of the writers.

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Now here's something I've been involved with. (Remember Monsterville? Well, these are the same excellent dudes at the Discover Centre.) See the PULL ME sign? My dad used to have me pull his finger and a dreadful thing would happen, and that experience still influences my work today...



Director Sally Goldsworthy approached me about working together with tall beardy man Philip Ardagh on a story: Philip would tell the story, and I'd work with their team to create a series of interactive pictures to go with it online. Philip writes (on Facebook, which I just nicked): DOWN THE PLUG HOLE, written by me and illustrated by Sarah, is of course, brilliant. The rest of the stories may be a bit ropey, but who cares? There's always ours to look forward to and then back on AND it's an official part of the Cultural Olympiad... the part bearded/part American part.



The Discover Centre plans to unveil them week by week, along with a great programme of stuff that encourages kids to make their own stories. Illustrators include fab people such as Chris Riddell, David Roberts and Guy Parker-Rees, and excellent writers Michael Rosen, Malorie Blackman, David Almond, Jamila Gavin, Andy Stanton and four kids from east London. Here are more StoryCloud details, and I'll give you a shout when the whole thing goes live on 18 June!

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Last night I went to the launch party of the new SUPERHEROES play town at the Discover Children's Story Centre. And I met the fearsome dude in charge: CAPTAIN STEVE MAY, at your service!



It was a little sad to see our Monsterville had been wiped off the face of the planet, but times move on, and the team at the Discover centre are always looking for awesome new setting to blow kids' minds. And they've done it again! So Steve May was the artist who worked with the team to design Alphabet City, and he did a great job. The exhibition runs until 4 November, so do get over to Stratford, east London, to run around and find your inner superhero!



The first thing you'll find is a handy rack of superhero capes.




Okay, now I know that the brilliant Edna Mode says capes are all wrong...



...but they're iconic superhero apparel. Isn't this a dynamic duo? All kitted up! These two totally rock.



Yup, then it was my turn. Caped and badged, A-class superhero that I am.



Okay, two more of that superchick, just because she personifies Awesomeness.



Now some photos of Alphabet City for you. Here's how it looks, before you even enter. Alphabet City is full of consonants, but visitors need to help rescue its vital vowels.



And once inside...



Lots of fab interactive stuff for kids to do and touch and drive.





And here are some of the fabulous Discover team who made it all happen! From the left, it's Eleanor Butler, Paul Callaghan, Steve May, sound engineer Sam Hooper, Director Sally Goldsworthy and Arena's Caroline Thomson.



Oh, and here is Paul blushing as Sally goes on about how Awesome he is. He was the main technician who made everything happen in Monsterville, and we all have such tremendous respect for this dude.



More photos from the night... here's illustrator Adam Stower and me:


Thanks to Arena Illustration for the photo!

Writer and storyteller Margaret Bateson-Hill and caped Discover supervisor Amelia Osborn.



The drinks were a mix of very

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Today was the closing party for MONSTERVILLE! This morning I tried to figure out which outfit would best suit my Monster cake shop, and decided this one would do nicely, it looks like a whole tub-full of sweets piled up on top of my head. (I got it at the Vintage Fair in Birmingham's Custard Factory from Julia Gandy at hOle button jewellery.) Dylan Owen on Twitter said it looked like my brains are exploding out of my head, which pretty much sums up Monsterville; it was a mind-blowing project to work on.



So I trotted back to the Discover Children's Story Centre in Stratford, northeast London, for one last fearsome hurrah.



There were three of us illustrators who worked with the Discover team to make it happen: Neal Layton, Ed Vere and me. Neal's wife just had a baby, so he couldn't come, but Ed and I had another wild Monster Draw-off. It was SO much fun!



We drew loads of 3-minute monsters, including 'Cutest Monster in Pyjamas' and 'Silliest Monster in a Car'. I didn't get photos of many of them, but here's Ed's 'Monsters in Love' and my 'Most Disgusting Monster'.




Ed gets very competitive. Here we are, sabotaging each other's paper.



It was a great party! Here are some lovely outfits from the day, including a fab-looking member of staff (Discover, can you remind me of her name?) and our excellent DJ, Laura Holden.



I couldn't get a non-blurry photo of the 1950's themed disco, but you get the general idea...



Ed and I had a wander through our creation with Director Sally Goldsworthy, quite sad to see it all come down, but thrilled we could be a part of it.



Considering the monster village had to be rebuilt almost every day, with the kids going nuts in it, it's amazing how well it held together. But when we looked closely, we could see a bit of wear and tear. Here's the window display in the Lolliplops cafe; apparently someone has chewed off the eyeballs on top of the cake.



And Ed's most excellent miniature cinema. He might get to keep that.



The party was part of a week's festivities for The Big Write, so there was lots more fun stuff going on today, including a Giraffes Can't Dance presentation by illustrator Guy Parker-Rees.



Chris Haughton also had an event (you might remember I went to his textiles launch not long ago). Both Ed and I are fans of his work, an

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With parents allowing looser rules over children’s media consumption in summer months (it’s no wonder kids dread fall and back-to-school time. During the summer, 49% of children watch more TV, 46% play more video games, 45% surf the Web... Read the rest of this post

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So exciting, here are some more photos of the work going on to build Monsterville at Stratford's Discover Centre! If you haven't booked your tickets yet for the family Monsterville Opening Day this Saturday, you might still be able to book them here. Oo, and I notice they've just posted a the new Monsterville summer events schedule here.

Here's my Beauty & Beast salon in progress:



And Neal Layton's bandstand's looking smashing.




This is the first I've seen of Ed Vere's wild forest approach to the village.



A little glimpse into the Lolliplops cafe interior:



And Neal's Monster Gallery. I'm so curious, what's going to be inside it?



(Click here and scroll down to see earlier Monsterville posts.)

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I've finished my drawings for Monsterville, but now the technicians, set painters, sound engineers and printers are working busily to make it all happen! The fab head techie guy, Paul Callaghan, just sent through these photos. Here's the basic frame for what will soon be Lolliplops monster ice cream parlour. (You can see my drawings here in earlier posts - scroll down.)



Have you booked your free tickets yet for the family Monsterville Open Day on 28 May?



Monsterville's proving to be a marvellous collaboration; Neal Layton, Ed Vere and I have an idea of how the village might look, then the team go out and find the pieces and adapt them. I love this red barber chair they found for the wig fitting shop! And I'm not positive, but I think they might be fitting eyeball push buttons on the old-fashioned cash register. From what I hear, the Monsterville offices are generally awash with eyeballs.




Here's Lolliplops, a bit further along:



And here's the Beauty & Beast emporium, which will have wigs galore.







Here's Neal's bandstand, which is going to be populated with lots of musical monsters. I think I remember some very cool-looking birds with teeth from his drawing, perching on top.



And a glimpse of Neal's monster museum. I haven't seen any photos yet of Ed's wilderness approach, more good things to come.



Here's Neal, me, sound composer Sam Hooper and Ed.

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First, here are a couple more pics I made for the Beauty & Beast boutique in Monsterville. These will pin up next to the mirror where people (and monsters) will go for their fancy wig fittings.



And here's a little tailor chappie to greet you when you come into Beauty & Beast. It's sort of like those funny gentlemen shops you find on Jermyn Street with big shaving brushes and shoe-horns. Except it also sells Marie Antoinette alien wigs.



It's funny, I'm not much of an expert on gentlemen's fashion, and I keep thinking, if I had more time, I'd love to get in three illustrators who know loads about this kind of thing. They would be my dean from art college Christopher Sharrock, Philip Reeve and David Roberts. These guys know everything about men's fashion, ha ha. Oh...Hurrah! I just saw that David Roberts finally got himself a website! I'm bookmarking it to go back and have a long look. David's attention to clothing detail - well, everything, really - is AMAZING.


Christopher Sharrock, David Roberts (I couldn't find a good full-outfit photo so one of his characters is standing in for him), Philip Reeve

So you can come see my monster boutique Lolliplops old-fashioned soda fountain and ice scream shop. And the other fab stuff Ed Vere and Neal Layton have been coming up with! Here are the details:

Welcome to Monsterville - FREE OPEN DAY - Sat, 28 May - All day
***To ensure a space on events please call 020 8536 5555 to pre-book.***

Set off a Monster Bank Holiday by coming along to the FREE launch of Welcome to Monsterville with the brilliant Sarah McIntyre (Morris the Mankiest Monster), Neal Layton (Emily Browne and the Thing) and Ed Vere (Mr Big).

11.30am 0+ Mini Monsters: Enjoy Story time for babies and toddlers in our Story Glade in the garden (inside if wet!)

1 & 2.30pm 5+ Monstrous Trail: Our Story Builders will take visitors on a tour around Monsterville - can you spot all the monsters lurking in the shadows? Are you up to the challenges and games?

12 - 12.45pm 4+ Ed Vere: Author of Mr Big and The Getaway will be coming along to delight us with live drawing we can join in with. Introducing us to his new book Bedtime for Monsters and telling us how he came up with his monster creations for Welcome to Monsterville.

1-145pm 4+ Sarah McIntyre: Fabulous illustrator Sarah McIntyre will be reading from her absolutely disgusting book Morris the Mankiest Monster and talking about how she created Monsterville's Lolliplops Cafe and Beauty and Beast Salon.

2.30pm 4+ Monster Draw-off: Monsterville makers Ed Vere, Sarah McIntyre will be drawing to become the most despicable champion monster creator of all time. Who will fashion the most terrible creature? Who will you vote for ?

3.30pm 4+ Neal Layton: Join Neal Layton illustrator extraordinaire as he shows of his sketchbooks and talks us through how he produced his amazing range of monsters for Welcome to Monsterville. Discover's Story Builders will then present Emily Brown and the Thing.

Monster Top Trumps: Drop into this event and draw your own monster, decide what their special pow

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A monster cake for the front window of Lolliplops sweet shop and ice cream parlour:



Right now I'm making two kinds of images for Monsterville at the Discover centre: the cakes, above, will be printed onto vinyl and stuck onto wood or foamboard, but the sets, below, will be painted by a team of theatre design people, so I'm just giving them a general idea of where everything goes and the colour scheme. I still need to do print versions of a few details, such as the Lolliplops poster and some of the little critters.





I'll do a print-quality version for vinyl of the Wigs & 'Taches advert, it's still in the rough stages. It's a happy little nod to the yetis in Alex Milway's Mythical 9th Division. The 'Lolliplops' name suggestion came courtesy of Graham Marks. Oh man, I love building these monsters' world. Working on a bunch of interior stuff today. And some over-the-top fancy WIGS!
(Click here for previous Monsterville blog posts.)

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Today I was back in Stratford, north London, doing some more work with the Discover story centre team to design the upcoming Monsterville, a village people will be able to visit, populated entirely by monsters! The Grand Opening's on Sat, 28 May, and you can read all about it and see sketches in some of my older posts here. It was fabulous seeing the brilliant Neal Layton and Ed Vere again, and meeting for the first time our soundtrack composer, Sam Hooper. Discover's general manager Paul Callaghan led the meeting, and wow, that dude knows everything about printing, vinyl, fake grass, lighting, you name it. So impressed.


Neal Layton, Sarah McIntyre, Sam Hooper, Ed Vere with Monsterville props


Drawing for the bandstand by Neal Layton


Ed Vere examines the Monsterville mock-up set





Yummy treats for my Lolliplops soda fountain cafe


Neal's museum curator


Agent Tamlyn Francis showing some of Neal's drawings


Neal's museum colour sketch


Ed's designs for the entrance


Discover director Sally Goldsworthy and Sam Hooper




Paul shows off some potential fur we could use




Ed's tunnel of doom


Ed and Discover's Eleanor Butler


Someone had already drawn on these monster cards; the scientist head made me laugh.


Can't go wrong with eyeballs!

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Another sketch for the Monster Village I'm building with Neal Layton and Ed Vere at the Discover Centre in Stratford. This shop's going to be a place for monsters to buy all sorts of personal grooming products and accessories. I'm just working on the interior, will hopefully post more soon. (You can see related stuff here.)



I was saying to Gary, 'I can't think, what other kinds of hairstyles would an alien have?' and he started laughing at me. I was being serious! Heh.

You can see some other mad monster sketches and other-worldliness by David Wyatt over on Philip Reeve's latest blog post about the makings of Larklight. Those monster should pop into this shop for some moustache wax.

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Awhile ago I did a couple events at the amazing Discover centre in Stratford, northeast London, (blogged here and here) and the director, Sally Goldsworthy, invited me back to meet up with two titans in children's books, Neal Layton and Ed Vere. While just meeting them was exciting enough, it got better and better when I found out our project was to build a MONSTER VILLAGE!

So we're going to draw a bunch of stuff and come up with ideas, then their team of techicians (led by Paul Callaghan, whose training's in theatre sets and lighting) will turn it into 3-D reality! I think this is possibly the best job I've ever had, even better than building stuff with Lego. Here are the two very fine gentlemen with whom I'm working:

Ed Vere and Neal Layton

Ed Vere got excited about the idea of visitors going down the stairs, into a mysterious jungle sort of trail, like explorers. And Neal and I loved the idea that, after beating their way through these mysterious tree trunks, fronds and swamp life, that visitors would emerge to discover a lost village of monsters, like coming up the Inca Trail. We thought that, while the streets of the town could be shadowy, with creatures peering out, the shops could be cosily lit; when you go inside, the shops could have lovely displays, but still very monster-ish. A sort of Diagon Alley (but for monsters, not wizards). So we got the giggles thinking of all kinds of shops the monsters might run, and I took on designing an ice cream parlour/sweet shop, with fascinatingly horrible things in the jars, a bit like the kitchen scene in Morris the Mankiest Monster but a bit more sofa fountain-ish.


Morris the Mankiest Monster

I'm also designing a beauty parlour, where the monsters go to get magnificently ugly. We were talking amazing wigs, claw extensions, moustaches, this is going to be so fun. So far, I've just made some rough sketches of the ice cream parlour. Things may change entirely, but I've named it Lolliplops, thanks to a great suggestion by the writer Graham Marks on Twitter (GeeMarks). Right now I'm keeping it simple, while I find out if Paul and the guys can build it, then we'll go in and add details and more monsters.

Here's the exterior. I think the space may need to extend a bit further back than I've drawn it (unless they build it like a Tardis).


And the interior. I think I'm basing it a bit on this place that used to be in my home town called Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour, that was my idea of sugar heaven as a kid. I thought it had gone entirely out of business, but bizarrely, a couple years ago, Stuart and I stumbled across one in Thailand, and I instantly regressed to the age of five.





Since we started working on this, I've heard from my friend Morvan and my agent Jodie that another amazing monster shop has opened in Hoxton! It's called The Minis

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Amelia Mae was always the one to explore her surroundings. A true pioneer she was the first to discover the unusual tree at the top of the mountain, near the edge of the forest. The sound of tiny giggles drew her nearer and nearer. There she found tiny beings with wings. Much smaller than the birds of the forest it was clear that these creatures could actually be transported by those very birds. Seeing the future of flight in the various wings around her she decided right then that she would one day become the first woman to fly around the globe.
And, of course, she would do that with a set of her very own handcrafted, highly polished wings.

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