We recently connected with Philomena Melton and have shared our conversation below.
Philomena , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What do you think matters most in terms of achieving success?
I think the most important aspect of being successful in your business is to remain teachable ! I feel the most important part is to stay learning and improving my skills and expanding my knowledge base of the mediums and techniques I’m interested in. There is always room for growth , and for me that is the best part ! I feel I could ,and most likely will be creating art for the rest of my life, and I could still never learn it all . There are so many incredible resources, online and off, and we are wildly lucky to have them all at our disposal !!! I also believe that empowering others and building wonderful relationships with other business owners and people in the industry , can make all the difference! Having a group of people that are on your team and wish to see you succeed, who can be a source of support, makes the world of difference in growing your small business and getting your name out there !
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Absolutely! My name is Maria and I got into this craft in a rather interesting way . I began breeding moths and raising butterflies about four years ago, as I have always been very fascinated by insects and plants and have always learned as much as I can about pollinators and insect diversity. Well after I began breeding moths I would sometimes have specimens that pass naturally in my care , that would be so beautiful I couldn’t bare the thought of discarding them in any way . So I took up making insect shadowboxes , and from there it grew into insect resin encapsulation, to insect wing jewelry , to larger glass cloche style pieces ,to many larger vintage frames and upcycled glass vessels , with lots of dried florals and earthy magic lsuch as crystals and dried mushrooms . I wanted to start to create little stories about the dichotomy between life and death , so I started adding ethically sourced animal remains , skulls , bones , etc. . Today my business is Nocturnaflora or (flowers of the night) and I create many varieties of home decor and jewelry items that all have a whimsical feel and carry a message of acceptance that death is a natural and sometimes beautiful part of life . I sell mostly at oddities markets and online , and I genuinely can not express how grateful I am to be doing this type of work , especially as a disabled mother , it’s given me freedom I’ve spent most of my life trying reach .I truly believe this is my purpose and I’m incredibly passionate about every step of it . My youngest daughter is 12 and very involved with the business , she comes to many of the events and assists me with creating pieces and moth breeding quite often, which has been a really wonderful thing for us to experience together , and I would say that’s the part I’m most proud of. As well as the connections I have made with other artists in the community, and all the wonderful people who purchase my art . I’ve made some amazing friends along the way and for that I could not be more grateful.
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
I would say the best source of new clients for me has definitely been vending at markets . Depending on the amount of people who come I can sometimes come close to selling everything I bring , and it’s truly fun to get to sit and talk with people and get to know them a bit as they browse. I also always end up with more followers who happened to pick up my card and followed me the next day , so that has even helped with more sales outside of the markets as well .
Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?
I think just being kind and helping to empower others that are doing the same thing ! It’s really helped me shift the way I view humanity to be honest. There are so many of us that are all doing similar things and it’s so refreshing to see all of us being so supportive of one another, knowing there is room for all of us at the top ! Unfortunately of course there are some that don’t view it that way , but most of us do and I think that has the potential to say at lot about someone. I can think of quite a few people who have treated me with kindness and respect and I will always remember them for that – now I try to do the same . I like to think that has truly helped people see where my heart is .
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