My next door neighbour here at the office is famous Dutch illustrator Philip Hopman.
He has illustrated and written hundreds of children's books and won a lot of prestigious prizes for his work.
One of his books in particular is a personal highlight of mine:
In 2017, the Hague Gemeentemuseum hosted an exhibition of clothing made by French fashion designer Hubert de Givenchy:
To Audrey with love.
It was a large-scale retrospective of his oeuvre and a tribute to his beautiful muse Audrey Hepburn.
His clothes became best known because actress Audrey Hepburn wore them in many of her films.
The Gemeentemuseum has a children's art book made for almost all exhibitions, and this has now become a beautiful series.
Philip was really flattered when he was asked to make the book.
A short story from Philip:
" I watched many of her films, read biographies, went to Paris to sketch, came up with a story and made the drawings in the summer of 2016. At the opening I met, very briefly, Hubert de Givenchy and gave him a drawing. “Thanks,” he said. "
Audrey Hepburn was not only beautiful in appearance, but also someone with her heart in the right place: as beautiful on the outside as on the inside.
As an ambassador of Unicef, she travelled the world to visit poor countries to draw attention to the importance of education and health care.
Here at Ines we love Audrey.
I think a lot of glove enthusiasts will do too...
Me and my lovely daughter Anna Emilia were also present at the opening.
I can't remember clearly but I think our gloves were being used for some parts of the exhibition.
Of course I bought the book for Anna.
Oh no, while I'm writing this I do remember that it was Ines that insisted to buy the book for her so she could give it as a present to her grand daughter Anna Emilia.
At that time Ines was already not able to attend these kinds of events due to her long-time illness..
Anna was so happy.
Its been one of the most read books right before sleep for Anna.
I think it also inspired her to start making her own fashion design drawings.
I will show you some later once I get her permission ;-)
All the beautiful illustrations you can see on our website, for example on the history of gloves page, are also made by Philip.
As a photographer of gloves myself, its pretty difficult to grasp the elegance of a leather glove in a picture.
Sometimes moving the position of the model's hand a little makes all the difference.
Some colors are more difficult to grasp than others, especially the color red is a hard one...
Its amazing to see how Philip is able to draw such elegant 'simple' lines with pencil on paper.
A special person and artist!
Bob, son of Ines