Mairi Hedderwick

Gourock-born Scottish writer and illustrator Mairi Hedderwick moved to the Isle of Coll in the Hebrides at the age of seventeen, beginning a life-long love affair with islands and their small communities. The Hebrides, where her children and some of her grandchildren were raised, are the inspiration for the fictional island of Struay, the world inhabited by Hedderwick’s charming Katie Morag character. Graduating from the Edinburgh College of Art, Hedderwick used to be a teacher, and to this day frequently visits schools – always accompanied by Katie Morag’s teddy.