Ruchi Mhasane author page

Ruchi Mhasane biography

Ruchi Mhasane is a children’s book illustrator. She holds an MA in Children’s Book Illustration from the Cambridge School of Art. Her work is commissioned by UK and international publishers across picture books and highly illustrated fiction.

Mhasane is the illustrator of Dadaji’s Paintbrush by Rashmi Sirdeshpande (Andersen Press, 2022; paperback 2023), which was longlisted for the Yoto Carnegie Medal for Illustration and selected in School Library Journal’s Best Books of the Year. Her picture-book credits also include Janis Mackay’s Scottish folk and fairy-tale retellings for Floris Books: The Selkie Girl (2014) and The Fairy Song (2021). She illustrated Robert Burns’s poem My Luve’s Like a Red, Red Rose for Floris Books (2016). Further titles include Sophia Payne’s picture book The Beautiful Layers of Me (Walker Books/Candlewick, 2025).

Publisher and retail listings describe Mhasane’s practice as character-led and narrative-focused, with pencil and watercolour techniques prominent in her artwork. She contributes to picture-book lists that foreground family stories, heritage and traditional tales for early-years and primary readers.

Dadaji’s Paintbrush won the Diverse Book Award (Picture Book) in 2023.