Cottage Grove teen's sketch selected for St. Paul Park Heritage Days logo

• Morgan McGahn

Morgan McGahn’s luau drawing was selected as the button logo for this year’s Heritage Days festival. McGahn, 14, lives in Cottage Grove. She’s holding a plaque she received for drawing the winning design. Bulletin photo by Scott Wente

Talk about it

Morgan McGahn’s preferred art medium is painting, but it’s a drawing that earned her attention.

McGahn’s luau-themed drawing in color pencil was chosen as the button logo for the 2012 Heritage Days festival.

The theme for the 28th-annual St. Paul Park celebration is “Luau on Broadway,” so McGahn started brainstorming for ideas by searching for luau photos on Google.

“I saw the tikis and the little bonfires and I was like, oh, that’s cute,” she said.

Her logo drawing has a background of palm trees meeting in the middle of the picture. In the foreground are two tikis with a bonfire in the center. The winning entry was her third or fourth sketch, she said.

McGahn said she has one of the Heritage Days buttons, and received a plaque that includes the first button that was produced.

McGahn, 14, is the daughter of Tom and Wendy McGahn of Cottage Grove.

McGahn, who is heading into ninth grade, said she enjoys art and the art classes she took at Cottage Grove Middle School.

“It’s kind of like a hobby,” she said.

The young artist will be in the Heritage Days parade on Saturday, but as part of a different hobby: she’ll be marching in the float for Dance by Kris, where she takes dance lessons.

Tags: st paul park, updates, entertainment