Waipawa School student takes out national design challenge

Kat Mooney with her winning bookmark design and her prize from the Dorothy Butler Children’s Bookshop.

When Waipawa School student Kat Mooney heard about a competition to design an under-the-sea-themed bookmark, she was very keen.

It covered two of her favourite topics, art and sea life, so she knew it was a challenge she’d enjoy.

The competition was run by the Dorothy Butler Children’s Bookshop, and the winning bookmark would be printed and given away with any book purchased at the bookshop.

Dorothy Butler OBE was a pioneering expert on children’s literacy and reading. She wrote many books for children, as well as books about the importance of reading for children, including Babies Need Books. She started her first bookshop in her family’s house on Auckland’s North Shore. In 1972, the business moved into a shop, and then in 1985 moved again to Ponsonby.

In the 1993 New Year Honours, Dorothy Butler was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for services to children’s literature.

Kat’s teacher at Waipawa School heard about the competition at the end of Term 2 and put the challenge to her whole class to enter.

Faced with a piece of card “not much bigger than an actual bookmark”, Kat says her inspiration - jellyfish - “just popped up”.

It took two hours for her to be happy with the design, as the template was small to work with and “the paint kept smudging and I wanted it to be perfect”, she says. The final image, in acrylic watercolour with a black acrylic background, shows a luminous-looking blue-and-white jellyfish with darker companions floating behind it.

Kat received 50 of her finished bookmarks to give away as gifts.

The design got Kat through to the finals against 1867 entries from 120 schools, and won her the top prize in her age group - she was also the only winner that wasn’t from an Auckland school.

“I was at school when I found out I was a winner. I was really excited,” says Kat, who received 50 of her finished bookmarks to give away, two books and a $50 voucher for the Dorothy Butler Children’s Bookshop.

She intends to spend her voucher on “art books and animal books” so she can continue with the artwork she loves.

“I love using acrylics and watercolours and painting all aspects of nature, especially landscapes and the sea. I’m going to keep on painting, maybe as a career, but definitely as a hobby.”

Some of her artwork could make its way to her summer school holiday roadside stall where she sells lemons and grapefruit, on Takapau Rd, later this year.

Kat has given bookmarks away to friends and family and will be posting some to friends further away.

The first one, though, went to “my teacher Mrs Waite, to thank her for encouraging the class to enter the competition”.