Andrea van der Kuil: ‘The voucher gave me the kickstart I needed’
- Fine Art
- Design
Her dream? Designing costumes and making textile art every day of the week, with the aim of living entirely from her own business. After Andrea van der Kuil received the starter's voucher worth €2500 in 2023, she was able to take another step towards this ultimate goal. How did she spend the voucher, and what does her life look like today? She'll tell you all about it in this story. “I remember thinking: can I really afford this? Kind of scary.”
At the time of the interview, Andrea is in South Africa – to attend a wedding, but also to visit her family. She was born and raised in Johannesburg but has been living in Amsterdam for the last few years. In 2022, she completed her master's degree in Performance Practices. “I studied in Arnhem – which is a really nice city – but I feel entirely at home in Amsterdam. There is something to experience every minute of the day.”
Forced to think more deeply
Like many students, during her studies Andrea already dreamed of starting her own studio, but she struggled to take the first step. Because: where do you begin? “It was a classmate who pointed me towards the starter's voucher at some point,” she recalls. “After looking up some information and visiting the Starter's Café, I thought to myself: I can do this. To me, it was an accessible way of asking for help.” Looking back, it wasn't just the funding that helped Andrea on her way towards realizing her dream, but it the application procedure was also an eye-opener. “Writing down my ideas and vision helped me a lot to determine my own direction. You're kind of forced to think very deeply about your business. I had all sorts of ideas in my head, but now I knew how to start putting them into practice.”
Chopping your dream into pieces
After her application was accepted, Andrea decided to spend the money on products that she felt were necessary equipment for her studio. “The most expensive thing I bought was a was an embroidery machine”, she said. “I remember going to the shop and thinking: can I really afford this? Am I allowed to just spend this money? It was kind of scary. Because I had started a business and I was able to reclaim the VAT, it felt like I could invest even more than those €2500 euros. I spent the rest mostly on smaller things, like advertising on social media and buying an iron.” Other than spending the money and writing the business plan, Andrea also remembers the conversations that led up to that. “Especially Cilly from the ArtEZ Business Centre really helped me on my way and showed me how to chop my dream into smaller pieces, in order to reach my long-term goal.”
A studio made available
As a self-employed person, Andrea works both for her own business as well as De Steek in Amsterdam – a workshop where people learn sewing and embroidery. “In addition, I also sometimes work together with The Collectives. Because De Steek aims to expand to Amsterdam East with a second location, I temporarily made my studio available to them as a kind of interim location. I'll build it up from here and we'll see how much interest there is. If everything goes well, they'll want to move to a bigger location. Of course, I'd ideally like to work full-time on my own business and design costumes and make textile art every day of the week, but this is a nice basis for now.”
The starter's voucher gave me the kick-start I needed”
For Andrea, the biggest challenge right now is to build name recognition. “I really love the theatre world. Under Stefan Leenaars, I recently worked on costumes for the show Mamma Mia The Party! in Rotterdam. Those kinds of commissions are really the icing on the cake. I hope, of course, that I will receive more requests like that in the future.
Shoot for the moon
Would she have made it here without the voucher? Andrea shakes her head. “No. The starter's voucher gave me the kick-start I needed. Of course financially, but it also made me dive deeper into my business and helped me turn words into actions.” Like no other, Andrea knows what it's like to have a dream, but to be unsure what path to take to realize it.
“Because of what my last boss told me, I believed for a long time that repairing and altering and adjusting clothing was the only way to make money. But that doesn't make my heart beat any faster, honestly. What I want to say is: write down what you really want to do, even if you think your dream is too big, and simply do it. It sounds simple, but in practice it can be quite difficult. Hold on to your dream, even if people think you're crazy. Even if you don't quite get there, at least you're on your way. Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars.”
