“I think being sexy is empowering, I do. But boudoir is so much more than that.”

This is my grandma.

Isn’t she beautiful? Doesn’t she just radiate joy and warmth and light?

I love it when people say I look like her. It’s the best compliment in the world to me. 

My grandma had muscular dystrophy. Growing up, I always knew she had a beautiful soul, but she didn’t physically look the same as she does here. 

So when I came across this photo of her while I was in college, I thought:

“Daaangg! My grandma was a for-real knockout babe who could stop tracks with her smile!!!”

She just took my breath away. I remember thinking, “Oh my gosh, this beautiful, joyful person made someone who made me. And if she is this beautiful……then I must be too.”

I have that smile, those cheekbones, those eyes that just light up with life…

They had been there all along. 

The only difference? Now I could see the things that had always made me beautiful because I could first see them on the beautiful woman who passed them down. 

So, yes, boudoir photos are sexy. But they are so much more empowering than that.

Imagine one of your boudoir clients 40 years from now. She’s a mom and a grandma. One day, her daughters or granddaughters stumble across a photo from her boudoir session tucked away in an attic somewhere.

They see the same curly hair that’s on their own heads….

The same curvy hips and thighs….

They see the very physical traits they wish they could change about themselves on their grandma—looking all jaw-droppingly gorgeous and stunning…

And suddenly it clicks.

“Daaaang. Grandma was a babe!!! And so am I.”

That’s why boudoir is powerful. That’s what you as a boudoir photographer are creating with your work.

The beauty in each woman is already there. Your job is to help her, and the generations who come after her, to see it and own it. 

Your job is to help end the constant, generational self-hate cycle so many of us go through.

Are you up for that challenge? Are you made for work like this too? I know you are. 

Click here. 

Emma