ONE WEEK ABOUT Driving Dutch Design by curator Patrick Aarts Sen (BNO). Over the next few days, we show the Drivers of 2025, Sophie Wantia is one of them.
Studio Wantia is a design studio that focuses on graphic and playful prints.
I have a background in Fashion and Textiles, where my obsession with colour and prints began. However, I quickly realised that I didn’t feel at home in the polluting fashion industry as we know it. It felt like I was just adding to a world that is already overcrowded. That “creative shame” became the starting point of my quest: how can I use my graphic imagery and playful approach in other ways?
So I started reusing existing materials and objects – products that already exist – and giving them a new lease of life through colour and print. This has resulted in Collectible Design, commissioned work and self-initiated projects.
As an intuitive designer, experimentation and research are very important to me. I have a strong sense of graphic composition and detail. Collecting structures, colours and shapes forms the basis of my work. I combine this with innovative digital techniques and analogue processes such as collage.
I explore how print is not only a 2D application, but can also be spatial – both physically and digitally. This creates a tension between the 2D plane, form and space.
Driving Dutch Design programme
Participating in the Driving Dutch Design programme initially gave me a great sense of recognition. I loved getting to know a new group of designers who are all following their own paths but who also have things in common. It has refocused me and literally given me extra drive to achieve certain goals.
Driving Dutch Design
Driving Dutch Design is the professionalisation and networking programme of the Dutch design sector that helps driven designers get started in the world of creative entrepreneurship. Besides Design your business and Design your identityfor startups, in 2025 there is also DDD Next Level for mid-career designers.
The organisation is in the hands of the BNO and the programme is supported by Stichting Stokroos and the Cultuurfonds, thanks in part to the Ahrend Fonds.
