Big henna (Kim, Help!!!)

A woman called who wants a full back piece in henna. She had been meditating and very strongly felt that she needed to get this henna piece (with certain elements, such as a calla lily, a certain number of butterflies, etc), so it is clearly very important to her.
First of all... OMG intimidating!! So far I have only done festival henna and small parties of 15 people or less getting (what I consider) a "medium" design, and always people who appreciated the beauty of henna, but did not have a spiritual connection with their design. So it has to be DAMN GOOD and DAMN PERFECT. That makes me like really second guess myself. I am by no means an expert or a pro, I am a newbie. A very new newbie. SO there is that problem.

Secondly, I seriously have no idea how to price this. I do 5, 10, 15 at festivals. Going by size, by that bracket she is looking at triple digits for sure. When I asked her how big she wanted, she says it depends on the price. I don't want to quote too high, i don't want to leave money on the table either.

Thoughts?

Hi Melody, well henna has to be very neat, and full back design with all the adds she wants it may take some time, I will charge not by design but by hour, I usually charge $125 by hour also what I do is to practice the design in a paper to don't waist henna I use sketch paper (because it has texture) and chocolate icing, to practice the design you draw, that is my suggestion, good luck!!

HI, this thread interested me because I too was just asked to do full back design for a gal. I did it once before for her and did large peacock feathers, based on a tattoo inspiration picutre. She loved it...I valued it at $75 because it took over an hour. I am sure professional henna artists would feel this is low but I am still learning and basically THIS was practice and I used her as a model for photos for my portfolio.
I agree having a drawn design to practice first is a great idea.

I am beginning to worry about this next job because the gal has not told me what she wants other than BIG! I would prefer having a better idea of what is expected clearly printed in my mind. I think I may just tell her $50 for 30 minutes...end of story.
Would love to see some back designs or photos from other artists...

Have you considered transfer paper? just print your design, transfer it to the person then henna away.

Kim
Thanks so much for the phone call this afternoon and passing down some wisdom. You are such a joy.

Oh boy I have to ask...what exactly is transfer paper and how does it work?

I had a tattoo artist show me tracing paper and spirt mimiograph (ditto paper) to transfer a design using stick deoderant but it left a really bright blue line and was difficult to remove...

yes. that is what i am talking about. it should wash off with alcohol.