Wed, Oct 14
Designing Books for Babies with Jon Klassen and Jess Hannigan
The book your kid makes you read for the fourteenth time is never the one you would have picked. It is almost always the one where the pictures are doing something the words refuse to confirm - a hat that is obviously stolen, an animal looking just slightly off to the left. Klassen built a Caldecott career on exactly that withheld joke, and tonight he and Hannigan talk about the actual craft of it: how you design a page for a person who cannot read, how much you can imply with an eyeline, why the funniest thing in a picture book is usually the thing nobody says out loud. This is the rare event that is genuinely for two audiences at once - the illustration and design people who study his negative space, and the parents who have the whole text memorised against their will. Skylight keeps a children's annexe next door, and the staff there will tell you which of his books survives the fortieth reading, which is a different and more useful list than the award list. Free, RSVP, seven o'clock, a Wednesday. Come whether or not you brought the kid.
The book your kid makes you read for the fourteenth time is never the one you would have picked. It is almost always the one where the pictures are doing something the words refuse to confirm - a hat that is obviously stolen, an animal looking just slightly off to the left. Klassen built a Caldecott career on exactly that withheld joke, and tonight he and Hannigan talk about the actual craft of it: how you design a page for a person who cannot read, how much you can imply with an eyeline, why the funniest thing in a picture book is usually the thing nobody says out loud. This is the rare event that is genuinely for two audiences at once - the illustration and design people who study his negative space, and the parents who have the whole text memorised against their will. Skylight keeps a children's annexe next door, and the staff there will tell you which of his books survives the fortieth reading, which is a different and more useful list than the award list. Free, RSVP, seven o'clock, a Wednesday. Come whether or not you brought the kid.
About this event
Details
Posts
Coming Soon
3,904 exploring this week
·
1,087 upcoming in SoCal
Designing Books for Babies with Jon Klassen and Jess Hannigan
Going? You can check in after it ends.
In 11 days ·
Wednesday, October 14, 2026
7:00 PM PDT – 10:00 PM PDT
Free (RSVP)
You found this. Be the first one here.
Join →
About
The book your kid makes you read for the fourteenth time is never the one you would have picked. It is almost always the one where the pictures are doing something the words refuse to confirm - a hat that is obviously stolen, an animal looking just slightly off to the left. Klassen built a Caldecott career on exactly that withheld joke, and tonight he and Hannigan talk about the actual craft of it: how you design a page for a person who cannot read, how much you can imply with an eyeline, why the funniest thing in a picture book is usually the thing nobody says out loud. This is the rare event that is genuinely for two audiences at once - the illustration and design people who study his negative space, and the parents who have the whole text memorised against their will. Skylight keeps a children's annexe next door, and the staff there will tell you which of his books survives the fortieth reading, which is a different and more useful list than the award list. Free, RSVP, seven o'clock, a Wednesday. Come whether or not you brought the kid.
You found your people.
They didn't know each other before Falkor either.
Add to Calendar
+75% shares · +6% members this month
