Toy Books
Toy books were picture books made for children. They contained colourful illustrations and often contained fairy stories, nursery rhymes or tales of children’s adventures.
Walter Crane produced his toy books between 1865 and 1875. Because of their bright colours and entertaining stories, they were very popular with both children and adults.
Walter Crane designed approximately 43 toy books. Many of them were based on famous stories such as Little Red Riding Hood, The Sleeping Beauty and Aladdin but some of them were written by Crane himself; these include King Luckieboy’s Party, Annie and Jack in London and The Adventures of Puffy.
Most of Walter Crane’s Toy Books were printed by Edmund Evans. Together, Walter and Edmund Evans produced bright, colourful children’s books which were a great improvement on other books available at that time. Walter was inspired by Japanese woodblock printing and particularly liked the black outline and bold, flat colour in these pictures.
Woodblock Printing
The Toy Books were made using a process called woodblock printing. This type of printing produced bright, colourful picture books, which became very popular with both children and adults.
Walter Crane would think about the story he was to illustrate. He would make a drawing of the scene and decide upon the arrangement of the characters and what they would look like.
When Walter was happy with his drawing he would wrap it up safely and send it to the printer, Edmund Evans. If Walter was in London he might take it to him himself, or give it to an errand boy to deliver to the printer’s workshop.
When Edmund Evans received the drawing, he would transfer the image on to a wooden block. In the early days, this would have been done by drawing the image on to the wood by hand, using a paper tracing and a pencil. For most of Walter’s books, however, Edmund Evans managed to transfer the picture to the block using photography.
Once the image was on the block, a printmaker would cut the wood so that the outline of the picture was left. This process was similar to cutting a potato or sponge to make a print. The printer would then make a ‘key’ print (a proof) from the block. This print would have no colour and would just show the black outlines of the picture.
Edmund Evans would send this black and white proof to Walter who would check the image and colour-in the spaces with paint. When Walter was satisfied with his picture, he would send it back to Edmund Evans.
When he had received the final picture, Edmund Evans would make up his printing blocks. A separate block would be made for each colour. These would be printed on the page, and a black outline printed on top to complete the picture. For example in this picture, the shape of the floor, rug, coat on the back of the door, Father Pig’s necktie and the small pig’s jacket would be left as a raised area on the block, coated with red ink and printed onto the picture.
Sometimes two colours were laid over each other to create a different colour. For example, laying orange ink over the pink of the pigs' faces could make the ginger of the father pig's hair. Texture, shading or pattern could be added to the picture by cutting stripes, lines and patterns into the block.
When all of the pages were ready, they would be stitched together and made into a finished book. These would then be sold in bookshops and would end up in children's nurseries at home.
