Wendy van der Veen(47) was born in Hague, Holland, and now lives in Marbella. She is specialised in ceremony wear and she is also an events organiser. She also represents the AMEF - the Women in Business in Fuengirola. i-Marbella spent 10 minutes with the businesswoman to find out more about her.

1. How did you end up in Marbella? What made you stay?

Since 1985 I have lived on Costa del Sol. In Fuengirola and Mijas Costa to be exact, but moved to Marbella for business mainly. The Andalusian culture in general made me stay here, as Andalusia represents to me the real "Spain" - great art, music, literature etc. In fact I always dreamt of live here since a young girl as I was fascinted by the

2. What do you do here?

I run a ceremony business and I organise events which always have a charity behind them. 

3. How difficult is it to run fashion shop and event company in Marbella? Does it pay off? We organise events not only in Marbella, but I must say Fuengirola has an important role. It is not easy to find sponsors to back you up. Mostly I try to do it without sponsors and do more of collaborations. 

4. What do you consider to be the highlight of your career?

The Highlight in my career was the Perfect Wedding Expo 2009 at the Palacio de la Paz in Fuengirola with over  60 companies  and a big musical and fashionshow. 

5. What is the key to your success? 

The key to succes in general is being yourself, know yourself very well, disicipline and hard working. And TEAMWORK!

6. What are you ambitions and plans for the future?

My ambitions for the future is to grow as an event organiser, to work more with musicians. And to always support charity. For example my future projects include the Black and White Festival  2012 at the Castillo Sohail will take place in Fuengirola for 2 nights and the Perfect Wedding and Eventexpo 2012. 

7. How has the crisis affected your businesses? 

The crisis has affected my shop as it has most of the business. In our case there are just less weddings and people can't afford to buy everything they want, so they have to adapt.

8. Do you also design yourself?

We did in the past many things, also evening dresses, men's wear etc. It was a special fusion between European cut and Indian embroidery. Many years ago we also designed all kind of headdresses and had our own shop in Bilbao with workshop.

9. Have some celebrities visited your shops also?

We are a quite well known business for 12 years and amongst our customers. Our celebrity customer is the lovely Saeko Hamada. 

10. What other interests do you have besides fashion?

Besides fashion I have a lot of different interests. I like to make fantasy sculpture figures that are inspired by Lord of the Rings. It represents Scottish Culture at the Coast (I'm not Scottish but I love their culture). 

I also work with the The Black and White Association that stands for the iguality between black and white persons here at the Costa del Sol. And I'm the president of AMEF

11. What exactly is AMEF? 

AMEF : Asociacion de Mujeres Empresarias de Fuengirola. We try to union all the women in business here in the area of Fuengirola. We have the support from the Townhall of Fuengirola and we offer information to those who want to set up a business, workshop, breakfast/meeting, info about subventions, exhibitions etc.