How My Hometown Vermont Came to Be…

Forty years ago, I picked up a camera and started photographing Vermont — the hills, the back roads, the light this state seems to bend through differently than anywhere else. I funded that myself for most of those decades, working a day job and shooting on the side, because the landscapes themselves were the point.

In 2013, I decided to see if I could turn it into something more — a business selling fine art prints of those Vermont landscapes. I learned the hard way that the internet lets anyone view great photography for free — there's less need to put it on a wall. The few people who still buy prints only have so much wall space to fill. I was competing against every other photographer online and at every art fair and gallery trying to fill those few empty walls.

So I started paying attention to where people actually put their pride on display, and it isn't above the couch — it's what they wear. Nobody's spending two hundred dollars on a framed print of their hometown, but plenty of people will spend twenty-four dollars on a shirt that says where they're from — especially when it's their actual hometown, not just Burlington, Stowe, or whatever ski town made the postcards.

That idea became MyHometownVermont.com. The plan was simple at first: one line of shirts, each carrying an original photo of the town it represented, because I'd seen firsthand that every town in Vermont has landscapes worth showing off. But I also get the fact that photography on a shirt isn't for everyone, and not everyone wants a shirt to begin with, so the line grew — non-photo designs, statewide gifts for anyone who'd rather wear general Vermont pride than one specific town, mugs, hoodies, and other products built around the same designs. The idea just kept growing from there, into a goal of representing every one of Vermont's 251 official towns, plus the villages, gores, and unincorporated places Vermonters actually call home, one community at a time.

So I guess this is why I made the move from arts to crafts. But seriously, I want to thank everyone for the encouragement, kind words, and support over the decades, and I hope this turns into a way to give something back to the towns and communities that gave me forty years' worth of landscapes to shoot in the first place.

Keith Edmunds – Founder, My Hometown Vermont

P.S. — Not every town has a photo product yet. That's not because I haven't been there — I've shot in every corner of this state — it's because I don't yet have a shot good enough to put a town's name on. I'm still on the road working through the list.

Don't see your town, or want to see something specific? Drop us a line and tell us your town, or a landmark you'd love to see, even if your town's already represented. We're adding new towns and new shots all the time, and we read every request.