How the Stuffed Animal Mansion Came to Life

The sketches are approved. The paint is finally going on this week. This is a behind-the-scenes look at how the Stuffed Animal Mansion is coming to life.

One of the things I’m learning as I create this book is how much thought and collaboration goes into every single spread and only Mille, my illustrator, and I see this normally. Here is a peek behind the curtain.

Pages 7–8 are especially important because this is the first (and only) time readers see the exterior of the Stuffed Animal Mansion.

This is the moment Jonner first realizes Heaven may be far more wonderful, playful, and alive than he imagined.

When I sent my illustrator the original vision for this scene, my notes looked something like this:

“Grand stuffed animal castle. Warm golden light glows from the inside.
I picture Jonner looking up at the castle with the perspective behind him.
In the windows are stuffed animals, too. I am thinking some from his bedroom. I do want a bunny rabbit waving and welcoming. Maybe a penguin or panda has his nose against the glass. A giraffe with long neck is leaning out a window and smiling. The front door is enormous. Outside there are also stuffed animal topiaries (think Edward Scissorhands).”

Then came the very first sketch, which you can see labeled.

At that stage, the goal is not perfection. It’s capturing the heart of the scene and beginning to shape the perspective, layout, and emotion of the page.

But as I looked at it more, I realized something:

I wanted the mansion to feel even bigger and more magical and more excessive in the way children imagine things.

So I sent revision notes back and included a picture of a concert poster from a Phish show for inspiration of a towering perspective and overwhelming scale to help explain the feeling I was chasing.

“I feel like the castle can use many more stuffed animals, hanging around balconies or windows. I want it to be excessive.

Can we shift the perspective up higher, like the picture attached? I want it to show the castle to be expansive, huge, grand in size.”

What I appreciate so much is that my illustrator didn’t just say “okay.” She thoughtfully explained the artistic tradeoffs involved:

“The page is landscape, not portrait, so as we zoom out and make the castle larger, the details naturally become smaller. The fluffy pillow-like textures will become more block-like, and the stuffed animals will lose some individual detail as they shrink in size.”

That was such a helpful moment for me creatively because it reminded me that every artistic choice comes with compromise.

Bigger scale = Smaller details.
More grandeur = Less softness.

And honestly? That’s part of what makes this process so fascinating. I am loving this project!

The second sketch struck the balance perfectly for me, and I approved it for painting. No more notes, not even an opinion on how she does the colors because I trust her.

Now we’re at the stage where we all are waiting eagerly to see this enormous stuffed animal mansion finally come to life in full color.

I truly cannot wait.

If you’d like to continue following this journey (and be the first to know when the book is available for pre-order), I’d love for you to subscribe and ask your friends to as well.

One of the things I’m learning as I create this book is how much thought and collaboration goes into every single spread.