The work aims to analyze the construction of the structure and form of Chinese characters in different historical stages, the evolution of writing carriers and the change of aesthetic concepts, and explore the design forms and ideas of contemporary picture books based on Chinese characters, so as to promote the inheritance of Chinese character education and the dissemination of Chinese character culture at present. Firstly, the characteristics of Chinese character-themed picture books were analyzed through data collation, and with the character "rabbit" as a vein, the evolution of Chinese characters and the aesthetic changes were sorted out. From the perspectives of philology, linguistics and psychology, the focus was put on the four aspects of "source, form, audience and display" and the design principles of "preciseness of genealogical sorting", "visuality of symbolic language", "acceptance of cognitive level" and "diversity of media presentation" were summarized in the design of picture books. Finally, based on the research theory and design principles, the creation of picture books and derivative designs were completed. Based on the premise of children's literacy education, the historical changes of Chinese characters are told in the form of picture books, which guides readers to know Chinese characters from the root and strengthen their macro-knowledge of the Chinese character system, improve their sense of cultural identity, alleviate the contradictions between the preciseness of Chinese character construction and the vivid illustrations, and between the richness of Chinese character knowledge and the limitations of linguistic expression, providing a useful reference for the practice of picture books with Chinese characters as themes.