The Story of Del Arroyo
A Knotty
Woman
From the boardrooms of international finance to a studio in the mountains of Sierra Calderona — one maker's journey into the art of the knot.
The Story of Del Arroyo
From the boardrooms of international finance to a studio in the mountains of Sierra Calderona — one maker's journey into the art of the knot.
She has always been knotty — by nature, by instinct, by a lifelong compulsion to make things with her hands that her hands weren't supposed to make yet. This is the story of how a seasoned international banker became one of the most singular voices in contemporary fibre art. It began, as all the best stories do, with a book.
For decades, Julia built a distinguished career in international finance — a seasoned professional at one of the Netherlands' most prominent banks, travelling across borders, navigating complexity. But beneath the precision of the financial world, something older and more patient was always present.
Growing up in the USSR, she had made fluffy toys in handcraft classes after school. She had sewn her own clothing — being a fashion lover in a Soviet country required certain skills. The hands remembered, even when the career had no room for them.
In 2016, a book changed the question she was asking herself. "The 100-Year Life" made her confront the obvious: can I do the same work for my whole life? And if not, what then?
"Can a professional banker also create something out of nothing? And where does one start?"Julia del Arroyo — Atelier Notes
The pandemic gave back the one thing a life of long hours and business travel had taken: time. Julia watched her husband Jeroen — an art director and entrepreneur — create daily, and asked herself a question she had been postponing for years.
Knitting had become unexpectedly fashionable. So she bought wool, needles, and taught herself to make sweaters. But sweaters weren't enough. She wanted to make something that lived in a room, that changed the atmosphere of a space, that could be shared.
Pinterest led her to wall hangings. The first piece was immediate and visceral. She fell in love — and went big.
Jeroen's family name is van Beek — from the Dutch, meaning
from the brook. In Spanish, the brook is the arroyo.
When Julia wanted to name her art — the practice she was building
in honour of her husband's support, in the country that had
given her new roots — the name arrived without effort.
Julia del Arroyo. From the brook. Of the water.
Julia and Jeroen moved to Spain — to a small village near Valencia, at the foot of the natural park Sierra Calderona. While Jeroen supervised the reconstruction of their home, Julia's hands were busy with something else entirely.
Spain became a source of inspiration she hadn't expected: its extraordinary natural light, the ochre and green of the mountains, the richness of its cultural history. The studio in Sierra Calderona is where Reverie was born, where Terroir was woven, and where one day, in a single moment of recognition, La Dama began.
"I started with macramé, but quickly discovered that just using traditional knots makes my works look like all others. That is how I started experimenting — with ropes in combination with wood, with scale, with form. I am on a learning journey, and I am developing my own language."Julia del Arroyo
