Stephen was born in Yorkshire in England in 1976. He has been illustrating since 1998 and creates pictures for books, posters, cards, jigsaws, maps, advent calendars, packaging and magazines. He likes to use bright, bold colours to create characters with lots of detail, lighting and atmosphere to tell stories.
He has written and illustrated his own series of books for Bloomsbury children’s books called ‘Get Busy This Christmas!’, ‘Get Busy This Summer!’ and ‘Get Busy, Dad’s Back!’ These books are about the adventures of a family of penguins.
His largest commission was in 2007-8 and it was to illustrate ’50 Favourite Bible Stories’ for Lion children’s books. The book was published as part of Sir Cliff Richard’s 50th year in show business celebrations. Sir Cliff selected the 50 stories and they were retold by the author and broadcaster Brian Sibley. Sir Cliff also narrated the stories on three accompanying cd’s.
Stephen shared with the children his love of drawing and painting, his early inspiration came from reading the Roald Dahl books. His favourites were ‘The enormous Crocodile’ and ‘James and The Giant Peach’. He also loved the energy and bright colours in “The Simpsons”. Art was his favourite subject at school.
Stephen worked with all the children in the school throughout the day and they were enthralled-“Awesome! Brilliant! and Wow!” were words repeated over and over by the children and the work they produced was fantastic- a memorable day…
