The first step to creating a beautiful children’s book cover is, of course, creating beautiful art. But even if you’re an exceptional artist, designing a book cover can be challenging. What images should you choose? What size should the font be? Above all, how do you balance being professional with being uniquely you?
How to Create a Beautiful Children’s Book Cover
Here are a few guidelines to help you create your best children’s book cover, plus some wonderful designs to inspire you.
Stay up-to-date on current design trends.
Self-published authors sometimes think they have to create a cover that’s completely new and different from anything that’s ever been seen before. But sometimes, the desire to stand out can lead to weird design choices that confuse potential readers.
There’s no shame in getting inspiration from other picture books. In truth, a lot of professional designers borrow ideas from other designers. After all, your art will already make your cover look unique from other books, even if you use the same underlying design concept.
In fact, staying up-to-date on recently-published picture books can ensure that your design fits modern tastes rather than looking clumsy or outdated. So, if you’re stuck, just browse a local bookshop for ideas!
I Touched the Sun – written and illustrated by Leah Hayes
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/i-touched-the-sun
How War Changed Rondo – written and illustrated by Romana Romanyshyn and Andriy Lesiv, translated by Oksana Lushchevska
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/how-war-changed-rondo
Pique the reader’s curiosity.
Your cover is a hook into your story. That means it should not only grab the reader’s attention, but also match your story, both aesthetically and content-wise.
Curiosity means that your reader will have a question in mind, which your story will answer. For example, take the following two covers. For Houses Floating Home, readers might wonder, “Why are the buildings floating in the sky? What kind of world are they tied to?”
For The Bathing Costume, readers might wonder, “Why is the boy unhappy? What will happen if his swimsuit falls off?” Along with the subtitle, “The Worst Vacation of My Life,” the cover entices readers to pick up the book and discover the details of the story.
Houses Floating Home – written and illustrated by Einar Turkowski, translated by Belinda Cooper
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/houses-floating-home
The Bathing Costume – written by Charlotte Moundlic, illustrated by Olivier Tallec, translated by Claudia Zoe Bedrick
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/the-bathing-costume
Show positive or empowering emotions.
A lot of picture books are bought spontaneously by adults for children they love. Oftentimes, the adults want to give those children positive experiences and uplifting emotions like joy and wonder.
While there’s definitely a place for negative emotions and difficult experiences in children’s books, it’s worth considering what emotion your cover is depicting and whether that emotion will prompt a spontaneous purchase.
Of course, you don’t want to mislead readers, either. If your book is about grief or a terrible vacation, your cover should make that clear. Still, even with challenging topics, it’s possible to create a cover that combines a negative emotion with something positive, like beauty or humor.
Days with Dad – written, illustrated and translated by Nari Hong
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/days-with-dad
The Boy Whose Head was Filled with Stars – written by Isabelle Marinov, illustrated by Deborah Marcero
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/the-boy-whose-head-was-filled-with-stars-a-life-of-edwin-hubble
Keep basic compositional rules in mind.
This point is important for illustrations in general, but particularly for your cover, since good composition is eye-catching. There are numerous compositional techniques out there: contrast, rule of thirds, leading lines, framing, etc.
If you’ve never thought about composition before, learning the different techniques can take a while. Fortunately, learning just one or two techniques can already transform the visual quality of your cover.
For a short introduction, here are some composition tips for children’s books. If you plan to be in the industry long-term, though, it’s worth digging into the subject and learning more about artistic composition.
The Story of Snowflake and Inkdrop – written by Pierdomenico Baccalario and Alessandro Gatti, illustrated by Simona Mulazzani, translated by Brenda Porster
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/the-story-of-snowflake-and-inkdrop
The Blue Whale – written and illustrated by Jenni Desmond
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/the-blue-whale
Use the power of simplicity.
One essential compositional technique is simplicity, or minimalism. While this technique is attractive for all ages, it’s especially effective with children below the age of five.
Kids under five are naturally drawn to simple fonts and strong, contrasting colors. Moreover, they can sometimes feel overwhelmed by details, particularly if they’re very young.
That doesn’t mean every page of your book needs to be ultra-simple, or that your cover needs to be minimalistic to be attractive. But there is a lot of power in simplicity.
Three Little Peas – written and illustrated by Marine Rivoal, translated by Claudia Zoe Bedrick
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/three-little-peas
Child of Glass – written and illustrated by Beatrice Alemagna
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/child-of-glass-forthcoming
Make sure the book title is clear and attractive.
This tip might seem obvious, but a surprising number of self-published books miss the mark with the typography, size, and color of their book titles. The cover image can be wonderful, but ultimately the title is what people need to remember for online searches and conversations about the book.
Because the imagery of a picture book is so important, it’s easy to focus so much on it that you forget the importance of the words as well. But the title shouldn’t be an afterthought. You should think about it already when selecting your cover image.
If your image is large and beautiful, like the Bertolt cover below, you might need to create white space for the title, so it’ll stand out. Even if you really love the full image, it’s more important to keep the title clear and attractive.
Bertolt – written and illustrated by Jacques Goldstyn, translated by Claudia Zoe Bedrick
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/bertolt
One Day – written by Lee Juck, illustrated by Kim Seung-youn, translated by Asuka Minamoto, Lee Juck, and Dianne Chung
https://enchantedlion.com/all-books/one-day
All of the previous picture books were published by Enchanted Lion Books, an independent publisher based in Brooklyn, New York, that specializes in children’s books. Browse their online shop for more examples of beautifully-designed book covers!