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Flower Fairies are illustrations by Cicely Mary Barker, created during the first half of the 20th century.
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Flower Fairies are illustrations by Cicely Mary Barker, created during the first half of the 20th century.
Flower Fairies are the product of English illustrator Cicely Mary Barker. [1] Unable to go to school as a child because of her epilepsy, she was home-schooled and spent much of her time drawing and painting. Her artwork was influenced by illustrator Kate Greenaway and even more so by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and she developed her talent as a member of the Croydon Art Society. [2] Her flower fairy paintings, in particular, were driven by the Victorian popularity of fairies and fairy stories.
Cicely Mary Barker published her first Flower Fairies book in 1923. [3] She received £25 for Flower Fairies of the Spring, a collection of twenty-four paintings and illustrations. The books enjoyed huge popularity due to Queen Mary’s well-known interest in fairy art. She later published seven more volumes of Flower Fairies. Following the publication of Cicely Mary Barker's original Flower Fairy paintings and verses, two series of fairy stories featuring original Flower Fairies characters, Flower Fairies Friends and, more recently, Secret Stories, have also been published. The Flower Fairies were Cicely Mary Barker's most well-known creations. They are notable in particular because of the sweet, realistic depiction of the children, modelled on children enrolled in her sister Dorothy's kindergarten. [4] She has also been likened to Beatrix Potter in the botanical accuracy of the plants and flowers amidst which the fairies dwell. The Flower Fairies and all related publications are licensed properties of Frederick Warne & Co and the Estate of Cicely Mary Barker. [2]
Below are the eight original Flower Fairies books and the dates they were published by Cicely Mary Barker's original publisher, Blackie. [5]
Though first published in the first half of the century, Cicely Mary Barker's original eight volumes were re-launched in 2002 with slightly contemporary jackets, while maintaining their classic artwork.
In addition, Frederick Warne & Co has published the following compilations of Cicely Mary Barker's Flower Fairy artwork and poetry.
Frederick Warne & Co have published two other series of fairy stories based on Cicely Mary Barker's original characters and incorporating her original artwork.
Flower Fairies Friends are books for younger readers, each telling the story of a particular fairy and her friends, and were first published in 2003.
Secret Stories is a new departure for the Flower Fairies. Introduced in 2006, they feature the characters of the Flower Fairies Friends books in chapter book length stories for 6-10 year olds.
A new range of gift books was launched in 2005 with Flower Fairies Journal (Fairyopolis) and continue with How to Find Flower Fairies (2007), featuring ephemera such as postcards, mini-books and letters plus tabs, lenticulars and pop-ups. They explore the worlds of the author Cicely Mary Barker and the Flower Fairies in exquisite detail. A sequel to Fairyopolis has been released, entitled Return to Fairyopolis.
The Flower Fairies are highly successful internationally and are sold in more than 35 countries. Flower Fairies merchandise includes items such as giftware, toiletries, cross stitch and stationery.
Clara Ingram Judson, writer who created her own Flower Fairies title, illustrated by Maginel Wright Enright, circa 1915.
Helen Beatrix Heelis, usually known as Beatrix Potter, was an English writer, illustrator, natural scientist, and conservationist. She is best known for her children's books featuring animals, such as The Tale of Peter Rabbit, which was her first commercially published work in 1902. Her books, including The Tale of Jemima Puddle Duck and The Tale of Tom Kitten, have sold more than 250 million copies. An entrepreneur, Potter was a pioneer of character merchandising. In 1903, Peter Rabbit was the first fictional character to be made into a patented stuffed toy, making him the oldest licensed character.
Cicely Mary Barker was the illustrator who created the famous Flower Fairies, in the shape of ethereal smiling children with butterfly wings. As a child, she was greatly influenced by the works of the illustrator Kate Greenaway, whom she assiduously copied in her formative years. Her principal influence, however, which she duly credited, was the artwork of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
Catherine Greenaway was an English Victorian artist and writer, known for her children's book illustrations. She received her education in graphic design and art between 1858 and 1871 from the Finsbury School of Art, the South Kensington School of Art, the Heatherley School of Art, and the Slade School of Fine Art. She began her career designing for the burgeoning greetings card market, producing Christmas and Valentine's cards. In 1879 wood-block engraver and printer Edmund Evans printed Under the Window, an instant best-seller, which established her reputation. Her collaboration with Evans continued throughout the 1880s and 1890s.
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Edmund Dulac was a French-British naturalised magazine illustrator, book illustrator and stamp designer. Born in Toulouse, he studied law but later turned to the study of art at the École des Beaux-Arts. He moved to London early in the 20th century and in 1905 received his first commission to illustrate the novels of the Brontë Sisters. During World War I, Dulac produced relief books. After the war, the deluxe children's book market shrank, and he then turned to magazine illustrations among other ventures. He designed banknotes during World War II and postage stamps, most notably those that heralded the beginning of Queen Elizabeth II's reign.
Mary GrandPré is an American illustrator best known for her cover and chapter illustrations of the Harry Potter books in their U.S. editions published by Scholastic. She received a Caldecott Honor in 2015 for illustrating Barb Rosenstock's The Noisy Paint Box: The Colors and Sounds of Kandinsky's Abstract Art. GrandPré, who creates her artwork with paint and pastels, has illustrated more than twenty books and has appeared in gallery exhibitions and periodicals such as The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, and The Wall Street Journal.
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The Tale of the Pie and the Patty-Pan is a children's book written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter, and published by Frederick Warne & Co. in October 1905. It tells of a cat called Ribby and a tea party she holds for a dog called Duchess. Complications arise when Duchess tries to replace Ribby's mouse pie with her own veal and ham pie, and then believes she has swallowed a small tin pastry form called a patty-pan. Its themes are etiquette and social relations in a small town.
Maginel Wright Enright Barney was an American children's book illustrator and graphic artist. She was the younger sister of Frank Lloyd Wright, architect, and the mother of Elizabeth Enright, children's book writer and illustrator.
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The Story of Miss Moppet is a tale about teasing, featuring a kitten and a mouse, that was written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter, and published by Frederick Warne & Co for the 1906 Christmas season. Potter was born in London in 1866, and between 1902 and 1905 published a series of small-format children's books with Warne. In 1906, she experimented with an atypical panorama design for Miss Moppet, which booksellers disliked; the story was reprinted in 1916 in small book format.
Frederick Warne & Co. is a British publisher founded in 1865. It is known for children's books, particularly those of Beatrix Potter, and for its Observer's Books.
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