Make Mine a Monster

This is what I got for Christmas. It’s a wonderful monster kit. These kits are created by the knitting ninja Donna Wilson and it encourages, in fact requires, you to use your imagination. There is very little in the way of instruction or direction. Every kit is made up of a different selection of materials and threads. You use the bits and pieces to make your own original monster.


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This central piece is pre-made and comes with the kit. Turn it inside out and stuff it (stuffing supplied) via the single opening. I did not like the shiny pink side that mine came with, preferring the carpet-like darker side. But this did give me an idea. The pink side would be my beast’s sensitive underbelly. The creature would be a crawler. Or, better still, a swimmer.


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I gave it flippers at each corner. Then some nasty teeth. My kit came with several red pieces. A tongue! Let’s call it the Big-Tongued Platy-Beast, distant relation of the Australian platypus (the platypus is in fact a very small monster that has evolved a shy temperament in the last four million years. Not many people know that).


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Eyes, fins, eyebrows … Done! But hang on … I still have a few pieces of red material left.


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Now I’m done. The Three-Tongued Platy-Beast. On the box Donna Wilson suggests you take a digital photo of your monster, email it to her and she’ll put it on her website. I wonder if she'll like it.

Physical Curiosities

Physica Curiosa was a reference book of bizarre animals and nightmarish humanoid creatures that, in 1662, were thought to be living out there somewhere in the world. Not too nearby luckily. Its creator was a priest called Gaspar Schott. It is believed that he did not do much fieldwork but relied on the reports of other people.


Left: "Monstrum biceps cum altero capite in ventre,” two-headed monster with another head in its belly. Right: "Monstrum septiceps,” seven headed monster.

The original book is in University of Iowa’s digital collection. You can look at it at this link. I first read about Gaspar Schott’s monster collection at the brilliant blog Res Obscura.

Monster Minds

Hello to all the kids of Belfast’s Lower Ormeau who I meet with recently. They were all taken out for the morning to Queen’s University and shown around its hallowed corridors. It’s just like Hogwarts, was the general consensus. In the university’s Great Hall I gave them a presentation on … what else? Monsters.


Thanks to Paul Maddern for this photograph and the next two below. This is me, being asked a tough question.

In the week leading up to their visit two staff members had been leading creative writing and drawing classes with them. The theme was monsters and they created whole books of brilliant drawings. It was great to see them.


One example from the student’s own monster book.


Another example. A monster with a pet monster. What a good idea! I may have to steal it. It is a quick, scrawled, drawing but I think that makes the creatures seem even scarier. Maybe the kid who drew was so frightened by their own creation that they just couldn’t colour it.

On the internet, an artist called Dave Devries has started a website called Monster Engine. The galleries there began with this one simple question. “What would a child’s drawing look like if it were painted realistically?” Below are some results.


Boo! Example one.


Another strange beast.


A dangerous ninja, with what looks like a vicious side-kick in a box. Or is she a prisoner?


Dave Devries's version. Not a prisoner, she kicks her way out.

Click here to visit Monster Engine.