Thomas Taylor

Thomas Taylor is a British artist and author best known in the Wizarding World fandom as the illustrator who created the original cover art for the first UK edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Commissioned by Bloomsbury Publishing, this artwork was Taylor's first professional commission and became the first visual representation of Harry Potter for millions of readers, making it one of the most iconic images associated with the series.

Taylor was commissioned in 1996 to create a cover for the then-unknown children's book. His work defined the initial look of the series before any other visual media existed.

• Front Cover: The famous front cover illustration, created with watercolour and pencils, depicts a young Harry Potter with his messy black hair and round glasses. He is shown standing on Platform Nine and Three-Quarters beside the scarlet Hogwarts Express, looking slightly bewildered. This image captured the sense of wonder and entry into a new world that defined the first book.
• Back Cover: For the original 1997 first edition, Taylor also drew an illustration for the back cover. This featured a kindly, brown-haired wizard wearing a distinctive tall hat and smoking a pipe. Taylor has clarified that this was not meant to be a specific character from the story, but simply a depiction of a wizard to look interesting and magical (Thomas Taylor interview). In later printings of the book, this illustration was replaced with a depiction of Albus Dumbledore by a different artist.

• Thomas Taylor was 23 years old and had recently graduated from art school when he was given the commission to illustrate the book.
• The visual identity of Harry Potter on the cover was created entirely from the text of the manuscript, as there were no other visual references at the time. This depiction is notably distinct from the portrayal of the character in the Warner Bros. film series.
• The original artwork for the cover of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was sold at a Sotheby's auction in London in 2001.
• After his foundational work on the Harry Potter series, Taylor has become a successful author and illustrator in his own right, known for writing children's fantasy novels such as the Eerie-on-Sea series.
• A well-known error on the back of a small number of first edition copies featured a generic, non-sequitur “blurb” that mentioned a boy feeding a polar bear. This was a publisher's template error and had no connection to either Taylor's artwork or the book's actual story.