The Women Flower Sellers of Grafton Street Film
The Women Flower Sellers of Grafton Street is a documentary short film by Patricia Mc Cann.
The Women Flower Sellers of Grafton Street is a short film written by Patricia Mc Cann in collaboration with the women flower sellers and filmmaker Vinny Murphy. The film is a representation of the inter-generational connection to selling flowers on Grafton Street including research in the National Archives, UCD special archives, the National Gallery of Ireland, and the Lee Miller archives in the UK. All combined it builds a participatory film work capturing the stories & legacy of the Women Flower Sellers on Grafton Street and their relationship to the city.
The film is funded through the Arts Council’s Artist in the Community Scheme Project Realisation Award, managed by Create, the national development agency for collaborative arts. The Women Flower Sellers of Grafton Street Film is produced by Common Ground.
The film explores the creativity & artistry of the women as both business women and florists; this is a skill of street traders often not explored. This work is the primary income of these women which supports them and their families. It can also be seen as a reversal of domestic roles as the women’s partners run the home while the women work on the street face to face with their customers and the pedestrians of Grafton Street.
During Patricia’s research in studio 468 she discovered that, the famous American photographer, Lee Miller, while on an assignment for Vogue, took a photo of Teresa Reilly, the current flower seller’s grandmother. This photo is housed in the National Gallery of Ireland’s collection, and the flower sellers’ viewing of the photograph in the archives was filmed for the documentary. The original Vogue magazine is in the UCD Special Collection archive.
This 40 minute short film combines all of these elements plus the stories of the women and a performative script reflecting a critical part of Dublin life and the role of working class women.
The film has been selected for the Dublin International Film Festival 2026.
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