We talk to the chair of judges and the 2025 winner of The Klaus Flugge Prize for Illustration, Emma Farrarons. Emma won the prize in 2025 which is for the year’s most exciting newcomers to children’s picture book illustration. This year she is back as the chair of judges alongside illustrator Rob Biddulph, illustrator and course director for the MA in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art, Anglia Ruskin University, Shelley Jackson and co-owner of the The Book Nook in Hove, Vanessa Lewis.
Emma won the prize in 2025 with her illustration of My Hair is as Long as a River by Charlie Castle.
This year’s shortlisted illustrators are:
Becky Colvin who studied illustration at The University of West England in Bristol and went on to win the prestigious Macmillan Prize for illustration in 2023. Becky loves telling stories, capturing both the quiet and the exceptional moments in life. The Great Green Island her debut picture book was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Books Prize. Her next book, Princes Don’t Practise, written by Kathryn Simmonds, is out in August 2026. Becky lives in Bristol.
London-based author-illustrator Laila Ekboir who worked as a freelance illustrator for many years in Buenos Aires, Argentina, before completing an MA in children’s book illustration at the Cambridge School of Art. Drawing inspiration from everyday moments and childhood memories of living in California, Mexico City, and Buenos Aires, Laila’s art is colourful, warm and rich in texture. She works by hand, exploring a variety of materials and using digital tools to make her work pop, but her favourite medium is printmaking. Laila enjoys telling whimsical stories with quirky characters, as well as exploring the themes of home, memory, identity and belonging delicately and thoughtfully. Her debut picture book, We Are Like Birds, is published by Kumusha Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Children’s Books.
Born in Weimar in 1990, Thekla Priebst studied visual communication at Bauhaus University Weimar and Berlin Weissensee School of Art. Since 2017, she has been living with her small family on the west coast of Portugal, where she works as a freelance art director and illustrator. With her flair for composition and colour, as well as a typographic sensibility, Thekla designs books from the first to the last page. The glorious The Voyage That Changed the World is her debut as author-illustrator. She has the ability to hold her breath for a long time because she likes to surf big waves. Thekla is currently based in Portugal.
Justin Worsley who has been a toy designer for over 25 years, and has now turned his hand to picture book making. He has a BA Hons in Industrial Design at Northumbria University, and in 2022 he graduated with a distinction from the Cambridge School of Art with an MA in Children’s Book Illustration. He has since won the Batsford Prize, the CA award of excellence and the Sebastian Walker Prize. Henry: the Artistic Dog is Justin’s first picture book. Justin is originally from Windermere, now living in Lewes.
Forest Xiao who is an image maker, storyteller, treasure finder and mother to two girls. She has lived in China, Germany, USA, the UK and Malaysia. Forest obtained a BA in Graphic Design from Camberwell College of Art which led her to the MA in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art. Forest was a runner-up for the Sebastian Walker Prize 2023, highly commended by the 2022 Macmillan Prize for Children’s Picture Book Illustration, and winner of the Batsford Prize 2023. Forest was also one of the 2023 Bologna Illustrators Exhibition Winners. Forest loves connecting with people and hearing stories. She is shortlisted for her book Seven Babies.
Circle Yuen who is an award-winning author and illustrator born in Hong Kong and now based in the UK. Her work transforms personal experiences of family restructuring and co-parenting into emotionally rich, healing narratives for children. A graduate of the MA in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art, she champions social justice and empathy through art. Her debut picture book Our Dance: Living Apart, Time Together is the first UK picture book to address child contact centres, created with the National Association of Child Contact Centres. Her work has previously been chosen for the dPictus Unpublished Picturebooks Showcase and was longlisted for the Illustrators Exhibition at Bologna Children’s Book Fair in 2024.
Katy
0:11
Hi, I'm Katy.
Ali
0:13
I'm Ali.
Katy
0:13
And welcome to Mostly Book Talk. We are very pleased to have with us today Emma Farrarons, who won the Klaus Flugge Prize in 2025 for her illustration of My Hair is as Long as a River by Charlie Castle. And this year she is back as the chair of judges for the Klaus Flugge Prize. And she's going to talk to us about the short list and the judging process and her experience of winning the prize. Enjoy. Welcome. We are going to talk today about the Klaus Flugge Prize. And we've got Emma Farrarons, who is the chair of judges, with us today, to talk about the prize and about the 2026 shortlist. So Emma was the winner of the 2025 Klaus Fluger Prize for her illustrations for the book My Hair is as Long as a River, which was written by Charlie Castle. And so welcome, Emma. Tell us a bit about your experience and winning the prize last year. Thank you so much for having me.
Emma
1:16
It was a really incredible feeling to win the prize. I've been a book designer for 16 years, prior to this always wishing to be on the other side of the files I was cleaning up. And and then to win an award for my first picture book, Achieving a Dream I've Wanted to Do. It was a if not now when moment after COVID. What's extra special about it is that it's gone full circle because it's published with my old team that I used to work for. My ex-colleagues, people have known before they had babies or got married, so almost like a family to me. Everything about it is just a wonderful feeling.
Katy
2:00
Well, what's it felt like going from being a winner to becoming a judge?
Emma
2:05
I think it was quite surreal to go to the Andersen office and meet the other judges and see the beautiful color books and realize that last year my book, My Hair is as long as a river, written by Charlie Castle, was in that exact pile and being looked at to be judged. I would say surreal.
Ali
2:24
And what surprised you most about being on the other side of the judging table?
Emma
2:28
So what surprised me about being a judge, I think one of the things that I probably did without realizing it was put my designer hat on and my storytelling hat on and my writer's hat on, as well as my illustration and my observational drawing hat on. So I used all of those. That's a lot of hats. That's a lot of hats. That's what I think that's what I did. What was interesting was to be with it, wasn't just me, we were four judges. So you have Vanessa Lewis, the owner of Book Nook, the bookshop in Hove.
Katy
3:03
Yeah.
Emma
3:03
And then you have Shelley Jackson, the course leader of the Anglia-Ruskin illustration MA in Cambridge, which is a prestigious course in insurance book illustration, and of course Rob Biddulph, who is an illustrator, author, inspirer, bestseller, who's been in the industry for many years. And so we all looked at each book carefully together.
Ali
3:28
And how many were there in the long list before you got to the short list? That is a good question.
Emma
3:34
We went through the long list. So I think there is a longer list of books given to Andersen Press, and then they did the first pass of it. That's right. And then we did the short list and decided on the winner on the same day.
Katy
3:48
Oh, so you already know. So you have to be really careful not to say anything today.
Emma
3:52
Exactly. Even my children who've been trying to find out have told me. In fact, the year my book was submitted for the class review, my children told me. We already know that you haven't won.
Katy
4:02
That's not the supportive vote that you hope that you'd get. You'd hope that they would be like, you've won, mum, you've won. Well, they were very proud when they found out. Oh, that's good. So let's backtrack a bit. Tell us just a bit about the prize, how it's established, why it's linked to Andersen.
Emma
4:18
It's something that Klaus Flugge has created and supports specifically to reach out to new covers and illustration in picture book illustration. And I can't think of any other prize of that sort that exists in the UK. So it's very special. It's very special to be able to celebrate this. It's a beautiful celebration of the picture book art, which is something that is really strong in the UK.
Katy
4:44
And why do you think to have a prize for newcomers, why is that so important just to have something that a debut illustrator can aim for?
Emma
4:52
There's a lot of recognition for authors and for illustrators who have been published for many years, and you see their books that uh they dominate libraries and bookshops. And it might even be that you grew up with a book, so you'll gift that book to your grandchild. And so to shine a spotlight on somebody who is entering for the first time this world and sharing their art and how they see and how they create image and storytelling, I think it's really special. And I think that's what makes the prize wonderful.
unknown
5:27
Yeah.
Ali
5:27
So there were 18 long-listed titles, and that's now narrowed down to a short list of six. Do you want to take us through them? You can tell us a little bit about them all.
Katy
5:37
Yeah, just to give our listeners a bit of an idea of what there is there, what they should look out for, which they should go and explore. The the new illustrators to look out for.
Emma
5:46
The illustrators who have made the short list are Justin Worsley, illustrator and author of Henry the Artistic Dog. Okay. And then you've got Forrest Xiao, the author and illustrator of Seven Babies. And then there's Circle Yuen, who is the author and illustrator of Our Dance, Living Apart Time Together. And then Laila Ekboir, the author and illustrator of We Are Like Birds. And then we have Becky Colvin, who is the author and illustrator of The Great Green Island. So all of these are picture books. And then we have one non-fictional book which is illustrated and written by Thekla Priebst, and it's called The Voyage That Changed the World. So these six books really stood out to us, the four judges. They're all very unique and beautifully illustrated because of the richness in the art and the narratives. We looked at the way the pagination has been considered, the art materials, the composition, the color, and the brave decisions on creating images. So because this is a price all illustrations specifically, we did our best not to look at the text and actually look at the craft behind. And we agreed that all six books had a lot of work. There was a lot of work and a lot of time spent on each image. And that's what made these six books really stand out for us.
Ali
7:21
Brilliant. Do you want to go through them one by one and just give us a little tiny pricey of each one? And one thing that stood out, maybe.
Katy
7:29
Do you want to go in alphabetical order? Start with the Great Green Island, just on the basis of it's as fair an order as any. So we're going to start with the Great Green Island, whose illustrator is Becky Colvin. So do you want to just talk about what that book's about and the art in it?
Emma
7:44
I don't want to give too much because there's a very exciting surprise at the end of the story, but it is about a little girl who is an adventurer and she goes on this exciting adventure. And what we loved about this book was first of all the character building, so the little girl herself, and then the world building, the world that Becky creates, as well as the relationship between the little girl and her father. And then when we talk about the world that Becky creates, the different people who live on that island, the houses, the streets, the sea, the flora and the fauna, we feel that Becky's really dug deep in her imagination to create this whole universe. And then to tie it in with a story as well, an exciting adventure that children can enjoy diving into. We thought that was very impressive.
Katy
8:39
Yeah, I think we were saying that the detail of it and there's so much to look at. And that some if the story is carried by the drawings, in they want to give away the reveal.
Ali
8:48
The drawings have a key role in the story. There's a lovely spread early on where there are so many rabbits to count. That thing where you can come back to a book and say, Oh, how many rabbits are there? How many chick- what can you see?
Emma
9:00
I also love the scenes she creates underwater. If you don't live by the seaside, this is the kind of book that transports you to another world as a child. So I can just imagine you're reading it in bed and being transported to this exciting world that Becky's built.
Katy
9:16
Yeah. Now I can see that you could spend a lot of time poring over the pictures in it and really looking at them. They're lovely. So the next one, We Are Like Birds. Laila Ekboir.
Emma
9:28
We Are Like Birds by Laila Ekboir is about a family moving to a new country, and it's full of emotion. What we found special about this book is that it's rich in emotion and feeling, and that's something really hard to do. We hear the story through the point of view of a little girl, and it's interesting to see how Layla manages to create feelings using these beautiful soft pencil and watch color textures and manages to show the world of the little girl. What we notice is that each spread she storytells also the emotions through color, which is very special. And then it is wonderful to see the journey of the family in this story, and how the little girl at the second to the last spread where she's holding a quilt showing all the place that she's lived. We found that spread absolutely beautiful. A patchwork of memories.
Ali
10:25
It is beautiful, and the cover's got my favorite things, some spot varnish on it, which I always like.
Katy
10:32
I think it's interesting that you highlighted the emotions because the drawings do an amazing job of communicating the emotions as part of it. Because that there is that real kind of trepidation and uncertainty around the unknown of moving.
Emma
10:49
And I would say pairing that with delicate, I would say a more fragile art material works really well here. Because actually, illustrators who use analog art material, so I would say, rather than digital art material, depending on the art material they use, the voice of that story, the atmosphere of that story can really change. So what we left is what she used specifically here to bring out the emotions.
Katy
11:13
Lovely. So then we've got the next one, which is The Voyage That Changed the World, which is the one nonfiction, which is Thekla Priebst.
Emma
11:22
So for this one, there's a lot. It's a 70-plus page non-fiction book about it's even got the Philippines in it. I think of Magellan arriving in the Philippines. It talks about history, and we were amazed of the detail Tekla created, the dramatic storms, the sailors traveling around the world, the juggle, the lush juggles with animal, and then the going back through time as well. So she brings us through time, and we were very impressed by how much research she must have done to create such rich images. It's difficult to visualize if you're reading the text on its own. And when you see the images that she's created, she takes you back through time.
Ali
12:08
And it was this analogue as well, because you can feel you can see the sort of pouchment feel of the paper underneath. Is it art painted or is it collage as well?
Emma
12:19
Yeah, I think it looks like it could be a mix of scanned textures, a lot of watch colour textures. And then I can see what you mean about the stencil because of the shapes. It almost has got a feel of printmaking. Um, but at the same time, it also looks as though there is digital it's a beautiful mix of all of it, really. It even all reminds me sometimes of cave painting, the textures and the colours as well. I think she's carefully thought again of the colour palette here to bring you back through time.
Katy
12:51
Yeah, it's quite a distinctive colourway, isn't it? And again, so much detail, as you mentioned, just so much to look at and spend loads of time exploring all of those pages. Yeah. Okay, brilliant. And so the next one we have is Henry the Artistic Dog by Justin Worsley.
Emma
13:11
I think what we liked about this book is that it's very different. It's a story about the dog who makes sculptures with his poop. Yeah. But it's very fresh. We were commenting on how we haven't seen a voice like this. It's zoomed in from the height of the dog as well. And it's very playful. And I know that Justin used to be a toy designer.
Katy
13:34
Right.
Emma
13:35
So there is this playfulness throughout the book. And that's what's so special about picture books. When you write a story, you can write about anything. And this is what Justin wrote a story about. So what we like about it is his line work is very quick. It feels spontaneous and alive. There's a lot of movement in the way he creates his art. And that's what gives it his artwork vivacity. And that's what stood out for us.
Katy
14:03
Yeah, it feels very distinctive. I think as you say, it feels fresh. I I can't think of anything that it looked like, if that makes sense. And as you say, there there is a sort of immediacy to it because it feels like it's got that pace almost in the drawing that's going through it. And I did love the story. I thought that was really funny. There are lots of critics of the numbers of who and we books or whatever, but this treats it in a very different way and is fun and interesting. We were laughing. When we were reading this one, we were laughing out loud. It's that kind of book, isn't it?
Emma
14:36
We also commended on how brave he is to think I'm done with this line, I'm not gonna continue at it. When he makes a decision with his line work or strokes, he just commits to it. Because as an illustrator, you've got to know when your piece of art is finished, and you can see that confidence in his art. That's interesting.
Katy
14:55
So the next one we have Seven Babies by Forrest Xiao.
Emma
15:00
Yes. So what we loved about this is that we were intrigued by the title. And when you open it and it's Seven Babies coming to knock at your door to be adopted for the day. It's such a unexpected story, and that's full of surprises on every spread. And we notice the humor and the chaos. And we also really enjoyed Forest Linework and her color palettes. And the world building again here is really playfully. It's all mostly set in inside. So for example, the spread with just the washing machine and the babies watching the washing machine twirl. Things that I think maybe it feels quite close to home. People can identify with the story, those who have children. We found this book a mix of many emotions, and it was also very funny and playful.
Ali
15:59
And just delightfully odd that these babies turn up on a doorstep and then they wander off again at the end to wherever they're going next.
Katy
16:07
Yeah, sort of mystery babies. Again, it's a really distinctive style and it's fun. So the last one is Our Dance by Circle Yuen.
Emma
16:17
It's a serious topic, this one. It's about family separating. This is a dance between a child and dancing with both parents. So we were struck by the emotion of this book. The color palette is limited, it's black and white and yellow. And a circle is circle pushes the emotional on the spreads using light on the happier scenes and pushes the charcoal for the darker, more emotional ones. And it's not easy to show such emotion for this book. And we think that she did a beautiful job in our dance for this. I think I felt quite tearful looking at this book. And that's why I that's why we chose it.
Katy
17:01
Yeah, it's a very emotional book. And the difference in the light and the dark passages is really distinctive and does take you through it and really make you feel the topic of it.
Ali
17:11
Yeah, it's nice that there's information at the back as well, I think. People. It's beautiful. And when she's dancing on her own at the end with everyone watching her, it is really gorgeous.
Emma
17:24
It's very impactful. We felt that it touched our hearts.
Katy
17:28
So that's a highlight, so an overview of all of the books. It's a really international spread, isn't it? Is it right that there are illustrators from Germany, China, is it, Argentina, and unsigned Britain?
Emma
17:41
That's right. Yeah, it is an international mix, for sure. And I think that's what I we love about picture books. It everybody brings their own influence and how in some way of how they've grown up and what books they've read or what they like and what inspires them. And that's what makes, I think at the end, that's how you create your voice, mixed with your own personal experiences. I if I'm not mistaken, I think maybe for Layla, she might have used a personal story or something, or maybe she might know somebody. We don't we actually don't know anything about them. Illustrators when we judge, we look at the books, so we're not given anything that may influence the judging of the books. That's interesting.
Katy
18:23
We're talking about the international aspect of it. I was just gonna ask you, because it feels like sometimes we have quite an insular look as in England or Britain, in terms of our picture books and our style, and that when you do go aboard and you look abroad, there's quite a lot of very different picture books. Is that something that you've seen? And is that changing? Is this the fact that there's such an international spread here? Do you think that is changing, that we're becoming more outward-looking in terms of the different styles that are around?
Emma
18:52
I think it's probably how the world is now. It's easier to work with illustrators, for example, if you're an art director to work with an illustrator across the other part of the world. Yeah. And also people are easier to reach. So, for example, if you live in another country, you could contact somebody, an art director, through LinkedIn or even Zoom if you want. And then this is the Bologna Book Fair, the World Book Fair, where every single publishing house of every country is represented. And there you could, as an illustrator, if you admire a publishing house, you could reach out with your portfolio. I know that a few of the illustrators in this lineup of the shortlist have studied at the Cambridge MA, the Anglia Ruskin. So they are international, it's an international course. In terms of me, I was born in the Philippines. I grew up in France. I studied visual communication in 2000 in Scotland. And then with the idea to get a job in publishing, I got my first job at Macmillan Children's Books in 2005. And I've been a picture book designer. So in terms of internationality, for me it's just binormal. It's just me. I think that as well geographically, the UK, even if the UK has a Brexit, is still for me very European. And the UK itself, I think, is very mixed. So people will bring in different influences naturally. But for sure, I think I would say growing up, I didn't see many books where people who looked like me were represented. And I can see a big difference in in that now when I go to a bookshop. And I can see it here in these books, Hour Dance, Seven Babies, We're Like Birds, and The Voch That Changed the World, as well as The Great Gree Island. Henry is about dogs. But in terms of the other picture books, there is a lovely diversity in the people who are illustrated. So for sure, I can see that books are changing. So for example, I specifically have created a book series I've written and illustrated called Wands Away. My character is Filipino, and she's based on myself and my children, and I'm intentionally making that choice. So I could see that. I can see that more present in the picture book world. Absolutely. But it needs to be more. There has to be more of that, personally.
Katy
21:21
That's interesting. And it's interesting the influence of the Cambridge School of Art course, because we keep on coming across illustrators. Who have you graduated from there? Yeah. And a really international bunch as well.
Emma
21:33
I was gonna add to that that the way I got into illustration is I did illustration tutorials on observational drawing, and that's how I found my voice. And my tutor is a Cambridge MA ext student. So I was taught by somebody who Somewhere there as well.
Katy
21:50
Yeah, an ex teacher. There's a real range of actual illustration techniques, aren't there, in those books? Were there any That particularly surprised you that are particularly unusual? Or what was your thinking? When you looked at like both the long list and the short list, what's your sense in terms of the variety of techniques that people are using and how people are putting together picture books?
Emma
22:14
We noticed that all art materials and ways of creating images, whether digital or with analog, were used in the book set, in the long list and the short list. Interestingly, Rob Biddlef is a digital artist, and I'm an analog artist. And then you've got Vanessa Lewis, who's a bookshop bowler, and then the course leader of the MA in Illustrations. So I think at the end we we didn't choose analog or digital over the other. What we looked at was the playfulness of mark making, and also, for example, what's really important is also the characters, how being reactive they are, the relationship the characters have together. So you've got that, and then you've got the richest of the backgrounds, and then the spontaneous line work. And if the image is rich in narrative, emotion, feeling, energy, and then of course you've got the storytelling elements, so the world building behind, and then you've got the color palettes. You can also storytell specifically just on color palettes. I mentioned earlier about Layla's book, which where she uses very soft textures to bring out the fragility of the emotions in her books. So I think what we noticed about all the books is that they made a choice on how to create their images and they did it in such a strong, emotive, powerful way. Bringing their imaginational and highlighting their imagination at its best with a choice of art materials and movement and feeling.
Katy
23:54
Lovely. These are all amazing books. If people are looking for picture books to add to their connections, they're all amazing books in terms of the quality of the illustrations and highlights.
Ali
24:05
And great stories as well, which is obviously not what the Klaus Flugge is looking at, but they they all hang together, don't they? The illustrations help tell the lovely stories. What happens next with the now the short list is out? When's the award ceremony?
Emma
24:20
So the awards ceremony is this September, and uh it'll be a big party at the Artist Guild. They're on the 9th of September. The winner will be announced. Yes, it's very exciting. The winner will be announced and celebrated and received this beautiful awards, the glass awards, for the most exciting and uh promising newcomer. So we're very thrilled about that. There'll be speeches and other past winners are invited to celebrate. And of course, the other people at Shortlist are also celebrated. It's a great way of as well talking with librarians and people who work in publishing, art directors and editors. Meet Klaus himself. Just a lovely party celebrating picture books. Brilliant.
Katy
25:10
Sounds amazing.
Ali
25:11
Our last question was: is there one piece of advice you would give to someone who's stepping out into this world of being an illustrator?
Emma
25:20
I think the best piece of advice I was given is to draw every day from life. Have a sketchbook with you in your pocket, in your bag, and with ready art materials, and just record everything around you always. It's a way of exercising your brain and also honing your craft in drawing, and also learning about what you like to draw and experimenting with art materials, discovering that maybe the dip pen is what you like using, or perhaps a color palette, or a subject you like drawing. So for me, the advice I was given in 2018, and I haven't stopped since. And it's something I use for when I come up with my story writing, and also it feeds my imagination and my memory drawing.
Katy
26:08
Yeah. Brilliant. Very good advice. Brilliant. Thank you very much. And it sounds very exciting, and we look forward to hearing who was won. Well, congratulations on your win last year and everything that you've done this year in terms of chairing the awards and deciding who's won. So thank you. Thank you for having me. Thank you.