Kasia is a British-born Canadian illustrator and graphic artist.
Kasia Charko has worked professionally as an Illustrator, Designer and Artist for 50 years.
In the early seventies fresh from art college she freelanced in London, England, working for magazines such as Petticoat, Radio Times, Honey, Fashion Forcast and many others, at this time she was offered a job by Whitmore Thomas Partnership who were responsible for designing the new BIBA.
BIBA was a London fashion store of the 1960s and 1970s. It was created by fashion designer Barbara Hulanicki and her husband Stephen Fitz-Simon.
In 1973 the store moved to the seven-story Derry and Toms department store on Kensington High Street, which immediately attracted up to a million customers weekly, making it one of London’s most visited tourist attractions.
There were different departments, and each floor had its own theme, such as a children’s floor, a floor for men, a book store, a food market, and a “home” floor which sold items such as wallpaper, paint, cutlery, soft furnishings and figurine table lamps. The overall design was produced by Whitmore-Thomas Partnership, run by artist/designers Steve Thomas and Tim Whitmore.
Kasia was commissioned by Whitmore-Thomas, to design and illustrate each department’s own logo, which was based on the BIBA logo and incorporated a picture describing the department. Kasia also illustrated most of the advertising and promotional materials for the new store.
Her original illustrations for the project are now in The Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
Kasia moved to Toronto and worked for many years as a freelance illustrator for magazines and advertising agencies, her work featured in Weekend and Saturday Night magazines and advertising campaigns for Nestle, Bank of Montreal, Segrams and numerous others.
Although the work paid very well, it became artistically unfulfilling.
Inspired by her passion for reading and her admiration of the illustrated books of her youth, especially Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland illustrated by John Tenniel, Kasia looked for publishers to partner with, it took many months and many disappointments before a fledgling publisher like her work and hired her for their project, that book was The Boogy Woogy Bear.
She now has over 50 published picture books and illustrated novels to her name for publishers such as Orca Books, Harper Collins and Sono Nis Press and numerous educational books for Pearson.
Kasia has always painted throughout her career, both for pleasure and commissioned work.
All the products are reproduced from Kasia’s original artwork and printed in Canada.