Paddington Bear

All about Paddington Bear

On Christmas Eve 1956, Michael Bond spotted a toy bear looking lonely on a shelf in the toy department of Selfridges. On impulse he bought the toy as stocking filler for his wife and, over the next few weeks, he began to write some stories about the little bear. Two years later the first volume of stories were published accompanied by drawings by illustrator Peggy Fortnum. The books went on to become an international smash hit, selling over 35 million copies around the world. In 1975 Paddington hit the small screen when TV episodes of Paddington Bear were made.

Michael Bond continued to write Paddington stories until the late 1970s and in the 1990s a Canadian cartoon version of Paddington was made using both original and new stories. In 2008, to celebrate 50 years since the first volume of stories were published, Michael Bond wrote a brand new set of stories for the 21st century. Nowadays Paddington even has his own Facebook page! On 15th of March 2012, Paddington was voted Britain’s favourite ever animated character at the British Animation Awards voted by the British public.