When we walk into a retail store and grab a product off the shelf, we really don’t give it much thought as to where it came from, who made it or the quality of that product. We have come accustomed to the convenience and affordability of mass produced items and simply assume an item is of high quality because it has a brand name.

I used to be just like you until I started creating my own handmade products.

I am a bead artist and I started creating Beaded Flowers just over 10 years ago. I had dedicated so much time and invested so much money in learning the craft. So you could imagine my excitement when I decided to sell my work to the general public. Where I live, we don’t have any craft fairs, so I decided to set up at my local flea market and boy was it an eye opener.

Many people walked by my booth that day and told me how lovely my work was. I was beaming with joy at my creations and knowing that others loved them, but no one wanted to buy one.  A young couple came along and the man had asked me how much it cost for one of my beaded roses. Excited about making my first official sale I told him the price. He immediately put the flower back down and said, “I am not paying that much money for a ‘fake’ flower.” and he stormed off, with his girlfriend in tow.  My heart sank and I packed up my beautiful creations that I had spent months creating for this one event and went home feeling like a failure.

Before you think that the man was right about being a fake flower, keep reading.

Yes, it is true, my flowers are fake, but they are not just some plastic flowers from the dollar store that are held together by hot glue.  The time it takes to make that “fake” rose is unthinkable for most. To be exact it takes 8 continuous hours to complete the process.

I first must decide on the flower I want to create, then I have to do a bit of math to determine how many beads I will need to make the petals the size I want and then i must choose an appropriate color that is true to nature. Then I must string tiny glass seed beads onto wire, imagine thousands upon thousands of beads. Then the beads and wire must be wrapped in a specific way and then sculpted. This is the process for each petal, stamen, pistil and leaf I create. Which is a challenge to do if I want it to look realistic.

But I am still not done and my fingers are sore and tired, now I have to assemble all those parts. Again, using more wire, which if not handled carefully can cut through a person’s skin as it is very fine. After 10 years I have some pretty rough hands for a woman. Once it is assemble the stem must them be wrapped and finally, details need to be added.

So as you can see the process is quite extensive, so after that day at the fleamarket, I just made my flowers to give as gifts for friends and family, who I knew would appreciate them, until I found Etsy. A place that was meant for handmade. I was so excited to meet other handmade artists and I immediate set up a shop. My shop wasn’t online more than a day before I made a sale. I waited a week for feedback hoping that my first buyer would be pleased with my work. I didn’t recieve a feedback right away, but she wrote me personally and told me that my flowers were a work of art and that she had never seen anything like them before and she couldn’t have been more pleased. She had told me she had purchased them to add to her wedding bouquet and planned on passing them down to her daughter when she got married.

Hearing from her brought clarity to the fact that my creations were more than just fake flowers. She could see the love, time and dedication I had put into them and decided to keep them as an heirloom to pass down to her daughter.

I am telling you this story, because very few people can see what goes into handmade creations. and are quick to judge a handmade product based on price alone. So the next time you see that “fake” flower or crocheted scarf and wonder why the price is so high. Please take into consideration every thought, detail, time, dedication of learn,materials and love that goes into each and every part of that piece.

Budding Creations can be found on Etsy!