Home Grown Flowers and Handmade Cakes
A year ago frustrated at home not being able to work during lockdown, I started to think of creative projects
'out of the box' so to speak as it is what fill me with so much joy, creating images with my photography. Also I needed to find a way to work which didn't involve working inside my studio! I had no clients, so it was worrying times as we were all locked indoors. Hence why I came up with the idea to do as many photo shoots possible outdoors at a 2 meter distance before we all had to go indoors again for another long period of time.
So one day I contacted Jane, who I have met through Instagram and worked together before with photo shoots.
I had this idea of documenting her work behind the scenes in her allotments to show the person behind the wonderful floral creations you can see in the 'gram squares' in Fuchsia in Bloom .
Part of the concept was to also submit the images to National magazines and see what happened with the hope to get much needed exposure in very worrying times, with a very uncertain future as vaccinations hadn't been mentioned then.
Sooo... a few days later, after editing the images I decided to just ' go for it ' and submit the images to a certain National magazine and just see what happened, we were back in lockdown so I had to try everything.
To my amazement and wonderful surprise within the hour I got four emails from various editors I had submitted the images with nothing but praise with immense interest to publish the images the following year
( this one 2021). So as asked, I refrained from submitting to any other magazines or showing the images in social media after numerous emails back and forth and long phone call conversations with the picture editor not only talking about purchasing the images but also suggesting I become one of their freelance photographers !! We were beyond excited and counting up the months ahead to see the images in print around the country in news-stands!!
Months went by as the pandemic started hitting hard and affecting many types of businesses and industries globally, so were the editorial companies, one of which who owns the magazine ( Country Living Magazine ) which had promised us a big editorial feature !!
So although due to the current climate things have changed and our dream to being published with these images never happened, we had a great day doing what we love and doing something otherwise I had never thought of.
So here I am writing my blog post on a rainy day in a London Cafe as my editorial version and a compensation to lovely Jane whom I felt gutted to tell her the news and was amazing with her response, these things happen! which is true.
And on the positive side neither of us have been affected by Covid, Jane is very busy creating wedding flower bouquets and Im filling up my diary with many portraits in my studio and on location, something we would never have dreamed a year ago :-) !
A little bit about Jane Westoby:
Based in Church Crookham, Hampshire, Jane Westoby grows passionately a beautiful range of florals split in between her three local locations ! Self taught, Jane has gone through a learning curve and evolved a wonderful Eco conscious business with carbon footprint and eco credentials being at the heart of everything the company represents. Specialising in seasonally focused floristry by creating stunning wild and bespoke designs for weddings and events. In 2019 Jane introduced handmade cakes beautifully decorated with the fresh flowers picked from her gardens as an added service for Brides.
After many phone calls, phone messages and mood boards the day finally arrives. Getting up at 5 am in order to load up the little mini car with countless props !! As usual I got carried away getting inspired by seeing things in my studio to add to the photoshoot story, so in they went to the car !! Including my shabby garden table and chairs !! Amazingly it all got in the car, 'by hook or by crook' as they say here in England.
Part of the photo shoot took part in four different locations, it was a long and exhausting day as we had to load up our cars with various props and photographic equipment, then arrive to the destination of-load the car, do various trips to the photo location, style it all and then take lots of photographs- no assistants. Just the two of us in the middle of nowhere but we were soooo happy as we had a fabulous time doing what each of us loved, specially after having been in lockdown for what it seemed a lifetime !
You can see bellow here in a little movie I did at the end of the day when I was so tired I couldn't remember how to speak practically !
The image above was the last shot of the day and as usual it tends to be my favourite image!
