Cartoonist Paul Slattery’s 103 celebrity Ramside Hall mural
Mar 16 2010 by Sophie Doughty, The Journal
VISITORS to a hotel’s newly-refurbished bar will now be watched by more than 100 familiar faces as they enjoy their drinks.
Owners of the historic Ramside Hall Hotel, near Durham City, have commissioned a record-breaking cartoonist from Newcastle to produce a mural made up of caricatures of some of the hotel’s most notable guests.
But when Paul Slattery received a list of names of all the celebrities, sports stars, and dignitaries to have graced Ramside’s rooms, restaurants, and golf course, he realised he was going to have to produce 103 cartoons, in little more than a month.
Thankfully, the 42-year-old, of Walbottle, loves a challenge.
In 1999 he earned himself a place in the Guinness Book of Records for producing the world’s largest caricature – a 60ft by 30ft image of Alan Shearer.
And he has already sketched a similar mural at the Heroes takeaway and cafe on Newcastle’s Grainger Street.
But for the mural at Ramside, Paul was required to draw everyone from Sir Bobby Robson and Les Dawson to close friends of the hotel’s owners.
He said: “The idea came from John Adamson, one of the hotel’s owners. He just emailed me a big list in February and I got cracking. They are all big characters that have made a big impression on the place so it was quite a challenge.”
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