The Story Was Already There

Beth Seliga

Aug 8

3 min read

Updated: Aug 13

A stepping stone in my journey in product photography for garden brands

Hope Flower Farm | Waterford, Virginia

by Beth Seliga

It is fitting that I begin this new chapter with Holly Heider Chapple.

Years ago, I was asked to photograph Holly for Wine & Country. At the time, I was somewhere in between.

My children were growing up. I had dedicated years photographing weddings, spending the most significant days of a family’s life celebrating and documenting moments both quiet and exceptional. It is an indescribable honor to watch lifetimes of becoming culminate in one incredible union of families, friends and lovers.

While I love the work, I had begun to feel the edges of it, like it had all been done before and was there, documented in a million different styles and color grading options on Pinterest. I kept wondering what else I wanted to see. What else I wanted to say.

I started paying more attention to the quieter stories. People who build things. Hands at work. Places that change over time. The kind of beauty that doesn’t need a camera, but is there if you look. Bees working. Flowers moving in the wind.

Then I met Holly.

She was in an in-between season of her own, and somehow we spent that day less like photographer and subject and more like two women sharing a moment in our lives.

We twirled, we harvested, and we delighted in the ordinary.

We wandered through the farm and talked and laughed and made photographs.

And we watched hawks circle overhead.

The story we had set out to make for Wine & Country never actually ran. But the photographs found another life. They were published in Flower Magazine, and the story didn’t end there.

Holly and I worked together again. And again.

I traveled to Ireland with Chapel Designers with my son for one of those assignments, a beautiful way to close out our homeschooling years. Another assignment followed with Bloom Imprint - this time a book. Eventually, photographs from our work together became part of The Flower Farmers.

Looking back, I see the pattern. It was there all along. I just had to work through it to notice.

That’s why relaunching Little White Greenhouse feels right. I want to tell stories that happen when no one’s putting on a show. I want to notice the quiet hours, the bees, the snails. This is where I’m headed. Little White Greenhouse is for stories about people who grow, make, tend, and build. People who shape their lives around what they love.

The work may be quiet.

The lives are not.

And Holly, it feels exactly right to begin here.

Thank you for helping me find the road less traveled before I even knew I had reached a crossroads.

I still think about that day often. The way you weaved grief, love, joy and inbetweenness into something beautiful magical.

Some stories take years to reveal themselves.

This one took its time.

I’m glad I finally found it, and I feel invigorated to explore a new direction.

Read: A Place of Hope and Healing - On her Virginia farm, floral designer Holly Heider Chapple draws from her own life experiences to share the restorative power of blooms.

Interested in experiencing the magic of Hope Flower Farm yourself?

Waterford, Virginia

Dahlia Days | September 25–26, 2026