Where's Wally?

Product Information

books were published in the UK by Walker Books and in the United States under the title Where's Waldo?

After much thinking, he came up with the idea of "Wally", a world traveller and time travel aficionado who always dresses in red and white. As an adult, Handford worked for three years in an insurance office (Crusader Insurance Company) to pay for his studies at UCA ( University for the Creative Arts) formerly KIAD (Kent Institute of Art and Design) in Maidstone, Kent. He began drawing crowds when he was 4 or 5 years old, and later as a child, making stick figures on paper. In 1986, Handford was asked by his art director at Walker Books to draw a character with peculiar features so that his pictures of crowds had a focal point. books, but his character was branched out into other products, such as notebooks, pillows, posters, video games and many others.

His inspiration to draw such figures came from classic films and the toy soldiers he played with during that era. The style of art executed by Handford is an example of " Wimmelbilderbuch" drawings, originally popularised by Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Brueghel the Elder and Hans Jürgen Press.

first by Little, Brown and Company before being taken on by Candlewick Press (Walker Books' American subsidiary publishing company).After graduating, Martin worked as a freelance illustrator specialising in drawing crowd scenes for numerous clients.