I did A Thing I’ve never done before—I commissioned art for my forthcoming book. Now, let’s make one thing absolutely clear—this was not because I wasn’t wholly, completely, and over-the-moon in love with my cover art, because I was, am, and will thus remain. But there was another angle of art I wanted to play with when it came to this book and these characters—that I completely lack the skill to make myself but really, really wanted to hang on my wall.
The other day I teased this out on Instagram and Twitter:
and some of y’all savvy, brilliant folks saw the inspiration right away: Art Nouveau.
i LOVE art nouveau. My favorite part of wandering around Paris last summer might just have been the Metro stations (ok, it was croissants and macarons, but it’s hard to beat delicious carbs).
Because The Fairy Bargains of Prospect Hill (ew gross I linked to my pre-order page I hate myself now) is set in the early 1900s, the connection to Art Nouveau was a natural one in my mind. So when I stumbled across artist @June_Page on Instagram I knew I wanted to see my characters reimagined as Mucha-esque figures.
And here they are:
I’m leaving that giant because I love them.
And because I like YOU, and we’re entering the cozy time of year when you might be so inclined to curl up with a mug of tea and some colored pencils and make some art of your own, I have line-art only versions of these—your very own coloring pages to play with. (Click on each image to open, save, or print so you can color to your heart’s delight!)
Enjoy! Make art! Eat macarons if at all possible!