Wilma van Boxtel
Perth, AUSTRALIA
I am an industrial designer for years but only started my freelance business five years ago when I moved to Australia from The Netherlands. Three days a week I design and the other two I lecture, at Curtin University, which I think is an ideal combination of spending my time.
As a child I had three passions; animals, discovering the world and drawing. Growing up at a small farm as the oldest of five girls, there were few possibilities for discovering the world, so I did it by reading all the adventure books I could lay my hands on. Later, when I was old enough to make my own decisions, I travelled all over the world to discover other cultures. Since I was able to explore the world around the farm, I had walked around with a stick and drawn big spiders in the sand.
When I was a teenager I had to make the choice about what to do with my future and was undecided between becoming a vet or an artist. My ‘down to earth inner’ wasn’t very comfortable with becoming an artist, so when I found out about the academy for industrial design, I knew that was it! So, I studied at one of the best design schools in the world, trained as an industrial product designer at The Design Academy in Eindhoven.
After graduation in 1988, I immediately left for my big trip around the world. That was my dream and I have always wanted to make my dreams come true! I spent three months in South America.
Back home I applied for jobs and the first response was from a bedroom furniture manufacturer. Since then my career path was set! I worked for about ten years as an in-house designer at two different bedroom furniture factories. At first, I worked with MDF and pine for the local market, but I had an international career in mind so after a while I switched to a multinational that made metal tube bedroom furniture. I learned a lot during these years. Being a designer I was involved in the whole production and sales chain. After ten years I was approached by the biggest retail company in Holland to set up a design and development department for them. This added commercial insight to my skills and finally made good use of my marketing degree! After three years in retail I moved back to production to be a Director Marketing & Design, which I only did for two years because in the mean time we received our visa to move to Australia.
I have kept my three passions alive; being creative in my profession, travelling as much as possible and always being surrounded by animals. My work was my hobby, except the last few years when I took a managing role. Being a member of the board and working a 60 hour week, there wasn’t a lot of creative work and my diaries were fully booked for months in advance.
I came to Australia with a bag full of experience, with 15 years as a designer in the furniture and retail industries. It has advantages to be experienced in manufacturing. It was new for me to work as a freelance designer for different companies because I had always been involved in the whole business in my previous jobs. I had to get used to work as a freelancer, to be involved only up till a certain level, but never as deep as I wanted in the beginning. On the other hand, the manufacturers I worked with had to get used to working with a designer as well. I believe in teambuilding; you can grow together, learn from each other and reap the benefits together.
Passionately striving towards more sustainable and versatile design my aim is to make Deseos a Trade Mark in domestic articles from furniture to house wares.
