This is a friendly reminder to love what you do, both in your career and personal life. Aside from the plants I help care for with my amazing NYC team, I come home to my own collection of over 400 tropical plants. Horticulture is a rewarding passion and luckily, I have also managed to merge this with my passion for painting.
During my college years pursing a B.F.A. in art, I enrolled in a summer painting program based in Mount Gretna, Pennsylvania- it was strictly for landscape painting “en plein air” (painting outdoors). I wasn’t cognizant to the extent of my plant blindness until I was sitting in the forest for 8 hours every day, visually internalizing and painting a plant subject (subject, not an object) on my canvas. I loved painting landscapes…I did not realize it then, but I was meant to work in horticulture.
In my free time, I paint as much as I can. Among other projects, I am in the process of completing 100 small landscape gouache paintings. So far, my favorite is number 33- it’s the one and only Empress tree (Paulownia tomentosa) in the New York Botanic Garden and I painted it soon after the park re-opened. I love these moments when my work and personal life reflect one another and everything feels synchronized.
Stephanie Morales, Indoor Account Manager