Bloom: A Story of Fashion Designer Elsa Schiaparelli

Description

Here is the life of iconic fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli, who as a little girl in Rome, was told by her own mamma that she was brutta. Ugly. So she decided to seek out beauty around her, and found it everywhere. What is beauty Elsa wondered. She looked everywhere for beauty until something inside of Elsa blossomed, and she became an artist with an incredible imagination. Defining beauty on her own creative terms, Schiaparelli worked hard to develop her designs, and eventually bloomed into an extraordinarily talent who dreamed up the most wonderful dresses, hats, shoes, and jewelry. Why not a shoe for a hat Why not a dress with drawers And she invented a color: shocking pink! Her adventurous mind was the key to her happiness and success-and is still seen today in her legacy of wild imagination. Daring and different, Elsa Schiaparelli used art to make fashion, and it was quite marvelous. Kyo Maclear and Julie Morstad, the dynamic duo who created the critically-acclaimed Julia, Child, team up again to bring to life the childhood memories and the inspiring milestones of the legendary Elsa Schiaparelli. With its warm, lyrical text and enchanting illustrations, Bloom shows readers how ingenuity, vision, and self-doubt all made Schiaparelli truly beautiful. A gift for her older fans and younger audiences who have yet to discover her genius, Bloom is sure to be an enthralling classic.

As a little girl Kyo Maclear wanted very badly to be a fashion designer. She spent countless hours in her London home drawing crazy dresses, including a very special giant cloud dress. Although not a fashion designer, Maclear is the critically acclaimed author of many children's books including, JULIA, CHILD, THE WISH TREE, VIRGINIA WOLF and MR. FLUX. Kyo holds an Honors B.A. in Fine Art and Art History an M.A. in Cultural Studies from the University of Toronto, and is a doctoral candidate at York University where she holds a Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship. When she is not writing, Kyo Maclear plants her garden with flowers in all shades of blue. Julie Morstad is an award-winning illustrator and artist. She has many children's books including, TODAY, HOW TO, and THE WAYSIDE. Her beautiful illustrations can be found in WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES; WHEN I WAS SMALL; THIS IS SADIE; JULIA, CHILD and critically acclaimed SWAN: THE LIFE AND DANCE OF ANNA PAVLOVA. Living in Vancouver, British Columbia, Julie enjoys her garden filled with dahlias, peonies, Cotton Candy grass, hydrangeas, cosmos and wildflowers.

"The duo behind Julia, Child offers a bold first-person biography of designer Elsa Schiaparelli." - Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Morstad's vivid mixed-media have an imaginativeness to match Schiaparelli's surrealistic designs (playing with a beloved uncle as a child, she soars amid the stars and planets of the cosmos) and feature splashes of Schiaparelli's trademark shade of pink...[It's] a dramatic tribute worthy of its audacious subject." - Publishers Weekly (starred review) "With beautiful, richly colorful, and playful artwork nicely evoking the character of its subject, this lyrical biography of Elsa Schiaparelli offers picture-book readers an enlightening introduction to the wildly inventive and influential fashion designer." - Booklist "Morstad's delicate watercolor illustrations do a great job of depicting Schiaparelli's designs, but subtle hints-pink flowers composed of dresses, shoes, and gloves, for instance-emphasize how Schiaparelli's view of the world shaped her artwork." - Booklist "Little ones who "dare to be different" will be inspired." - Booklist "In full scenes and vignettes, Morstad's mixed-media paintings capture the lanky, classy panache of Schiap and her designs." - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books "Using Schiaparelli herself as narrator, this picture-book biography tells the story of her unsettled childhood and rise to premier couturier for a young audience." - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books "Together Maclear and Morstad have created a picture book that, like Elsa's art, is "daring, different, and whole" and that reminds us that "together, we BLOOM and BLOOM."" - Jennifer Oleinik, Shelf Awareness (blog) "Morstad's (When Green Becomes Tomatoes) lush illustrations match Maclear's enlightening narrative... [her] illustrations rise and fall with Elsa's emotional and artistic journey." - Jennifer Oleinik, Shelf Awareness (blog)