We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Hilaree Brand a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hilaree, appreciate you joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

While I was a vendor at PINNERS conference in 2023 a woman came into my booth. She was so very quiet in such a hustle/bustle environment. She appeared to be searching for something. When the time felt right I asked her if there was something specific she was looking for. She said, “Yes. I’m looking for a dragonfly.” In my eagerness to please, I quickly grabbed 3 different breeds that I knew I had. When I handed them to her, she paused, her eyes filled with tears and then hesitantly said, “These aren’t it. I’m looking for a blue dragonfly.” I told her that I did have a couple different blue dragonflies but I would have to ship them to her as they weren’t ready for the show at the time. When I showed her the Picture of the Kuapi dragonfly, the tears brimming in her eyes spilled over and she said, “That’s the one. That’s the one that has been following me everywhere since my son passed.” She told me the name of her sweet little boy, how much she missed him. How heavy the grief had been and one day she noticed this Dragonfly everywhere she was. She felt it was a message from her son saying he was near her and he loved her. She asked me to please make a frame specially for her. The craziest part about this story is that the dragonfly that was following her was not native to where she lived. Infact, it is mainly in Southeast Asia. It was an honor to be a tiny part of her story on her path toward healing.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I started LUX + WHIMZI late 2022. This was my so called chapter two. I had previously built and sold a business after owning it for nearly 20 years. It was difficult to know who I was without the identity of the previous business. I went through an intense period of grief. Even though no one died, the Hilaree I had become was gone. I didn’t know what else I wanted to do. Where I should put my focus. I felt like I was barely existing and not contributing in any meaningful way. I was also burnt out. I missed my old life but didn’t want to go back.

One day, I happened to see a youtube video where a woman was pinning butterflies. I thought I’d like to try it but honestly thought it would end up being another half hearted attempt at a hobby.

It took a year to get brave enough to try pinning the first butterfly and when I did, I destroyed the butterfly. Tried again and over hydrated the butterfly, causing mold to grow on it. I tried again and was finally able to get a barely passable pinned butterfly that somehow, looked more dead than when I started. This was the first time in over a year and a half that something felt like a worth while challenge. As I became more familiar with the pinning process, it started to feel like a meditation, then therapy and to my surprise, healing. I was able to process so much grief and even depression while learning my new craft. I told my hubby that I didn’t want to turn this into a “business” it had to stay a hobby or I would ultimately burn out from my tendency to over produce and over work. My warning didn’t work. We started to have a lot of bugs framed and hung on our walls. Very quickly after that we were out of wall space.

Rather than asking my husband to build another wall, I thought I would venture into the land of Farmer’s Markets.
I was absolutely shocked when I was accepted to my first market. I was even more shocked when I realized I had out sold everyone else at the market. I felt encouraged to try again, but I was now faced with the new challenge of working more efficiently if I were to book another market anytime soon.
You see, hobbies aren’t usually time sensitive. Hobby projects can mosey on for as long as one wishes. A business, however, creates deadlines and that is where creation and boundaries meet. I struggled with boundaries in a big way. Said yes, to almost everything. Creatives really struggle with saying no. Our drug is the possibility of what we could create. This leads us to get every version of every product in our hobby.

I know it’s the drug of “possibility” more than the results for creatives because we are way less excited about what we’ve completed and way more excited about what else we are going to make. This is why we have 72 pending projects and 1 almost completed project at-all-times. While this is the life of a creative, it works against us when we try to translate into the business world. In the business world met expectations are where currency changes hands. When a client asks for a website and you say, “No, I just have instagram, DM me.” You effectively said, “I’m a creative, not a business person. Don’t count on being able to have this experience again.” Not a great formula for building a returning clientele. I personally have a tendency to over produce and try to check all the boxes, my personal challenge is to be very aware of what my “not business” is costing the important people in my life. Me, my partner and my children.
To prevent this from happening I have started vetting my potential venues and markets more thoroughly to make sure my “not business/hobby” is staying in the ‘worth-it’ category for me. I’m very mindful of the following.

-Length of the Market. 1/2/3/4/5 days. I rarely do 1 day markets now.

-Expected number of attendees. It’s not worth it to build, pack everything only to attend a dead market.

-High and low end pricing at the market. * This one changed everything for me.

If I know these three things, I can expect reasonably great to amazing success at a market.

By asking these questions, I have information to weigh out whether a given event will cost me and my people or if it will benefit me and my people. This is an example of what a boundary looks like in this “hobby/business.”

While the beginning of this journey was expectedly chaotic, through time I’ve been able to find strength in creativity and passion in selectivity. I used to say yes to every opportunity, I do not say yes to every opportunity now. Because of this, I am able to avoid burn out, resentment, and boredom. I’m able now to leave a market feeling recharged, grateful, satisfied and ready to do it again.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

At the end of the day, it is the connection I make with my clients. Each piece is meant to bring clients back to nature, back to presence, back to their hearts.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Society can better support artists and creative through pausing, and trying to understand the process of what it takes to create something. I’ve heard over the years, “oh, it’s JUST a butterfly.” Technically that is true. BUT, in my case, it takes 2 hours to cut, sand and polish the wood of the frame, more time to clean and cut glass. 5 days to pin and set a butterfly, create tags, pricing, and then pack it up, drive it to the market, spend hours setting up just to be able to present it to the world. I believe the validation and appreciation of the time it takes to be in a booth, sharing what we did with our time would go a long way. The presence of the onlooker shows gratitude to us. Do you have to live the pieces? No. Not every piece of art is for everyone. Just remember that “just a butterfly” represents HOURS, DAYS, WEEKS of work. We forget in an AMAZON PRIME world that things are not always mass produced by billionaires. That mass production is a relatively new concept. Humans connecting with themselves through art is how we stay individuals.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.whatnot.com/s/skGqRUgh
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/luxandwhimzi?igsh=bnk1aXFpenN1Znpx&utm_source=qr