Alexander’s grandmother, Nonna, grows a glorious garden, but struggles to find time to play until Alexander decides to grow seeds of his own. 

“Before your seeds can grow upwards,” Nonna says, “the roots need to grow downwards.” And Alexander learns that building relationships and nurturing seeds into saplings both take love, patience and time.

Alice Bianchi-Clark has lived and worked in big cities, including Rome, Paris, London, Beijing, Hong Kong and, most recently, Singapore. Perhaps this is why she treasures pockets of greenery, no matter where they sprout. When her son’s theatrical ambitions stretched to London, she followed him there, while her supportive husband stayed behind in Singapore with her balcony of flowers and butterflies. In the absence of a garden or balcony in London, Alice filled the fireplace of their skylit flat with ferns, ficuses and fiddle-leaf figs. Alice now divides her time between the two cities.

As an illustrator based in sunny Singapore, Chloe Chang spends her time reading, drawing and applying sunblock lotion. She graduated from the School of Art, Design and Media (ADM), NTU Singapore, with a degree in Digital Animation. One of her first projects was Mediacorp’s 3D animated children’s television series, Lil’ Wild, where she was lead character designer. Chloe now focuses on children’s book illustration and works with local and International publishers to bring stories to life.

Alexander learns from his grandmother that, like nurturing seeds into saplings, building relationships take love, patience and time.