Interview: a little Dutch girl named Brecht Olsthoorn
Once upon a time there was a little Dutch girl named Brecht Olsthoorn who loved to watch her mother and father making beautiful clothes for children. She was so inspired by the beautiful fabrics, colours and patterns that she aspired to follow in her parents’ footsteps one day.
Roll on a few years and that little girl who watched in awe at her parents fabulous designs is now herself a children’s designer with her own boutique, Room Seven. Now fully grown up, Olsthoorn has three beautiful children of her own and people from all over the world love her unique range of clothing, bedding and playwear.
Growing up watching her mother, designer and founder of Dutch children’s brand Oiliy, inspired the young girl from an early age. “When I was a little girl my brother, both my sisters and I used to play hide and seek in between the big rolls of fabric piled up in my parents’ warehouse. That’s one of my earliest memories,” she says. “Then, when I got a bit older I used to help my mother to cut fabric swatches to make her style-books.”
But it was when Olsthoorn had her daughter four years ago that she came up with the idea of using all the different beautiful prints that she had developed for the bedding collections for making her baby girl some unique clothing. That is how the Room Seven clothing line for girls and boys was born. The brand first introduced a range of nightwear that was hugely successful and then launched its first clothing collection in 2002.
Olsthoorn’s boutique, Room Seven, comprises an array of baby and children’s clothes, bedding and accessories, as well as her gorgeous clothing collection, She designs two exclusive and eagerly awaited Room Seven bedding collections each year and a whole range of lifestyle accessories for mums, babies and children including nappy bags, bibs, sleeping bags and soft toys.
“We were a very close and creative family and as I grew up I watched the way my mother and father loved working together and how their skill, enthusiasm and creativity built their company Oilily into such a beautiful and inspiring brand,” she says.
By the time Olsthoorn left college in 1994, she knew she wanted her own boutique and started out by opening a shop in Alkmaar, Holland, selling a mixture of textiles and antiques that she would find on her trips to India.
While Olsthoorn enjoyed this and still has the shop today, she couldn’t get away from her love of textiles and began making quilts out of fabrics she sourced on her travels. When she began to sell these in her shop she was amazed by the incredible demand for her lovely creations and soon she was designing a whole bedding collection with her own exclusive prints. Room Seven now designs two exclusive bedding collections each year, which sell in boutiques throughout the Netherlands and all over Europe.
But it was when Olsthoorn had her daughter four years ago she came up with the idea of using all the different beautiful prints that she had developed for the bedding collections for making her baby girl some unique clothing. That is how the Room Seven clothing line for girls and boys was born, they first introduced a range of nightwear that was hugely successful and then launched their first clothing collection in 2002.
You can view the entire Room Seven collection of bedding and children’s clothing at roomseven.com
