It has been more than ten years in the planning, but the new centre for children's books finally opens its doors today. Nick Morrison takes a tour of all Seven Stories.

IT'S a fair bet that, at least as far as most of the exhibits at the new centre for children's books are concerned, the amount of attention they attract will depend on the age of the visitor.

The original line drawings for Ballet Shoes will hold a particular thrill for those who grew up in the 1930s. Their children may be captivated by the draft manuscript for The Borrowers, showing its original title, Under the Floor. The next generation, in turn, may find the early manuscript for Danny, Champion of the World, most absorbing. For today's children, Jacqueline Wilson's own design for Tracy Beaker's adoption advert will be a crowd-puller.

It is a peculiar phenomenon of children's books: that those which mean most to us now are those we loved as a child. And so it was that I found myself fascinated by the original artwork for Mr Benn.

Then, of course, there are the exhibits which will draw crowds of all ages: the artwork of Quentin Blake; the first cover and draft manuscript of Philip Pullman's The Subtle Knife, the second part in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and, the most prized item in the collection, a hand-written draft of Chapter Six of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, The Journey From Platform Nine and Three Quarters, complete with JK Rowling's extensive crossings out, and augmented by her line-drawing of Hagrid holding the baby Harry. This exhibit is valued at around £1m.

It is the likes of Blake, Pullman and Rowling, who have crossed over into the adult world, who have made the centre for children's books, or Seven Stories, to give it its new title, possible.

"All of them have made children's books news, but they have also brought children's books to adults," says Elizabeth Hammill, artistic director of Seven Stories, which opens in Newcastle today. "Adults who maybe had forgotten or who hadn't experienced books, are now reading children's books.

'They have engaged grown-ups in a way that perhaps wasn't there before. The world of children's books has changed quite substantially in the time we have been doing this project."

It was way back in the 1980s that Elizabeth first had the idea for a centre devoted to children's books, a response to the loss of many original manuscripts and illustrations, in the face of official disinterest in the genre in Britain.

"Work was just going abroad and we needed to do something about it," she says.

Elizabeth, a native of New York State who moved to England with her husband in 1971, had been instrumental in setting up the Northern Children's Book Festival, and was then head of the children's department at Waterstone's in Newcastle. Through her contacts with writers and publishers, she found enthusiasm for her idea, which started to evolve into something bigger.

"I thought what we needed was not only a collection, but galleries where you can show work and an education centre where you can explore writing and illustrating. Children are fascinated by how things work and how they are put together.

"People thought it was such a simple idea, why had nobody done it before," she says.

At first Elizabeth looked at London, and when the finances didn't stack up, turned to Oxford. But Oxford didn't seem the right environment, so she finally settled on Newcastle.

"There would not be loads and loads of competing attractions, there would be complementary things going on and this would bring something critical to the city and the region that wasn't there before," she adds.

Then came the offer of a collection belonging to Robert Westall, the North-East-born author of The Machine Gunners. Along with the archive was £100,000 towards a capital project, and the dream suddenly started to look like a real possibility.

But while Elizabeth was comfortable with the artistic side, she felt less at ease with mechanics of getting political backing for the project, so in early 1995 she teamed up with Mary Briggs, who worked for Newcastle City Council. At first, they kept their day jobs, but in 1997 formed a charitable company and devoted their energies to it full-time.

"We both went in feeling passionate about what we were doing and we had a conviction that it would bring something really special and important to the country that was missing, and that carried us through," Elizabeth says.

"There were all kinds of obstacles, mostly in terms of funding. It was a kind of a roller coaster ride: we would have really brilliant moments, and then we would sink into a trough."

The centre started out at St Peter's Wharf, but even while they were searching for a permanent home they started holding exhibitions. The first, showing the work of Colin McNaughton at the Discovery Museum, attracted 7,500 visitors. Others have featured Japanese picture books and the work of Kim Lewis, the Northumberland-based creator of Floss the sheepdog.

Finally, the search ended at a seven-storey Victorian building in Byker, previously used to store grain but then standing derelict. The £6.5m total cost of the project has included donations from the Arts Council and Newcastle City Council, as well as from publishers, charitable foundations and individuals.

The collection is the heart of Seven Stories, and also includes drawings for the first edition of Paddington Goes to Town, illustrations from The Iron Man, an Anne Fine manuscript, original Janet and John books, artwork for The Gruffalo, and original drawings for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

But only two floors are given over to the galleries, reflecting the aspiration to be more than just a collection. As well as a caf and display about the centre itself, there are areas for children's workshops, a story lab where they can compose their own tales, a bookshop, a space for book readings and performances, and a room where they can just sit and read.

"In the first instance, we wanted to create a physical home for children's books, which there has never been before, but we wanted a place where all the people involved in children's books could come together and work together and explore and create, and who knows what possibilities might come out of that?," Elizabeth says.

"We would hope that anybody who comes here will go away feeling incredibly excited about children's books, and that they have started on a journey and hopefully they will go away and explore. I think the creative possibilities of this place are huge, but what we want everybody to discover is that books can take you anywhere, you can be anyone, do anything."

* Seven Stories is at 30 Lime Street, Byker, Newcastle. Admission is £5 for adults and £4 for children, with under threes free.