A WRITER is drawing on the talents of local designers to help illustrate her first children’s story books.

Author Kiran Kaur has enlisted BTEC Extended Diploma in Graphic Design students from Cleveland College of Art and Design (CCAD) to bring the characters in her rhyming books, The Draught and Puddle in a Muddle, to life.

Ms Kaur, 28, of Acklam, Middlesbrough, said: “The inspiration for my first book all stemmed from telling my daughter ‘don’t let the draught in’ when she was coming in the house.

“She didn’t really understand and was a bit scared about letting in a ‘draught’ as though it were some kind of monster.

“This gave me an idea so I started to put some thoughts together on paper and produced my first short story about an imaginary mischievous monster dreamt up by a five-year-old girl called Poppy.”

Being a busy mother-of-two, Ms Kaur's handwritten stories were put to one side for four years before she posted them on the internet and eventually got a call from a US publisher.

After getting the deal she approached CCAD based in Hartlepool and Middlesbrough and ten students have been given the task of presenting their illustration ideas to her. She will choose the winner in February.

The Draught is set for worldwide distribution this summer with the possibility of an animated series being developed in the future.

Illustration student Blue Lunn, 17, of Saltburn, said: “It is very exciting having such a high profile brief.

“It is quite difficult to come up with ideas that match the clients but we have been given a lot of freedom to put our own stamp on the work.”