Esperanza, the story of a farmers market florist

Esperanza! Although not the name she started with, she does mean a lot to me.

Up until that point I had only been making hand printed note cards and she is the first stamp I carved without the intentions of creating a card. For me she is the beginning of creating art beyond cards.

I made a few prints and put them online for $20 each. Not because I thought that’s what they were worth, to me they were worth much more based on the time I put into it. I just wanted to see what would happen, see if anyone would buy it, and hopefully get encouraged to do more. It’s surprisingly hard to tell the others “my art is valuable”, I’m always reminded of this when pricing it(doubt has many sneaky tricks).

I named it “Farmers Market Florist” because to me she represents the woman at the farmers market with beautiful bouquets, who could could be selling out of a fancy florist shop for more but for now sells at the market for much less. Not that she doesn’t value her work but because she knows its a step in the big dream that she has.

Sometimes I call her the “Hustler Florist” when I’m trying to make things happen, My friends and husband call her Esperanza, (I’ve always thought of her as Megan) but whatever her name I hope she encourages you to work hard and make beautiful things.

-Susanna Cromwell

p.s. Esperanza is still and will always be $20.