Responsive: Design Process 2 - Concept Development Crit

I chose a selection of books from reading age 7-8+ 
BFG
Wind in the Willows
Matilda
Secret Garden
Peter Pan
Pinocchio
James and the Giant Peach

They are all fantasy stories in a classic limited edition set where they would be promoted in a book stand away from the shelves.

Key Characteristics:

Wind in the willows - 
friendship
adventure
leisure

BFG -
don't judge people
big/small
friendship

Matilda - 
friendship
adventure
magic powers

Secret Garden - 
friendship
adventure

Peter Pan - 
adventure
fantasy

Pinocchio - 
morals
fantasy

James Peach - 
fantasy 
adventure
  
Visual research boards

Design Ideas:

Looking at the original illustrations and stories I found key aspects that would connect the imagery with the story to create nostalgia in parents in order to attract them to the classic story. I looked at illustrative styles to try bring the stories to the new generation of children and make them more modern. I choose basic vector and pattern imagery to go from as the sketchy illustration is more old fashioned. I came up with the idea to keep the penguin heritage in the books with the band around the top and bottom of the book but reworked it with the imagery so its either using or interrupting it to create a whole image with the already well known design. I brought the two ideas of illustration and design concept together using key aspects of the stories.

 Development Decisions:

The 5 things I want to get feedback on:

1. Shall I do one block colour or have more illustrative, colourful atheistic?
2. Is it clear what the design is doing?
3. Are the images recognisable enough?
4. Do they attract the right audience?
5. Would they stand out against others?

Feedback:

Consider the spine - thats usually on display and needs to draw attention - could it be sticking out the bookshelf etc.

Could you bring them more to life eg. smells and senses 

Ideally two colour scheme

The peter pan hat idea works well and matildas book should be slightly slanted to make it more clear

We had the presentation of dos and don'ts of entries into live briefs. This inspired me to think of how I could expand it from more than a series of books and go beyond the brief even more. I had consider the bed time story aspect being not as popular these days, I want to expand on this and try and emphasise how I could bring it back with some form of solution. Also I thought of shop windows for book stores as promotional material and how the shops have borders at the top and bottom like the penguin book design. I could capitalise on this aspect to create a proposal of a window display idea for the children stories.