Imagined Realities, Realized: Following Jasmin around Amsterdam

One of the most active social butterflies in Amsterdam’s creative scene, Jasmin Vivian’s friends have a saying: ‘Follow Jasmin’. 

It’s good advice, if you’re keen on spending your time in interesting ways and places. Following Jasmin will take you to her quarterly clothes-swaps that often (d)evolve into dance parties, or you might find yourself at Sexyland, where she could be behind the bar, programming a creative event, or both. Lately, she's been popping up backstage at some of the city's biggest shows, having taken on stage managing since the summer.

Tuning into Slim Radio? You might have caught her show, ‘Imagined Realities’, an utopian-inspired broadcast where you were just as likely to hear Lauryn Hill, delve into an in-depth discussion on relationship anarchy, or groove to the latest Amapiano hits.

Jasmin's journey to Amsterdam began back in 2019 during a study abroad year at the University of Amsterdam (UvA), while completing her undergraduate degree in Anthropology. Thanks to the pandemic, she had to move home before the year was up–but our city had already worked its magic on her. "I felt like I had some unfinished business with the city," she admits. "So by the time I graduated the year after, I decided to come back and look for a job here."

One small hiccup: she didn't have a job lined up. A family friend nudged her to explore Amsterdam's events industry, and the idea really clicked. "It really united everything I'm looking for–my anthropological background, something a bit more creative, purpose-driven, and fun ultimately," Jasmin explains.

Within a few months of her job search, Jasmin faced a crossroads: accept a full-time gig at a consulting firm, or take an internship at an event agency. With the encouragement of her mother, Jasmin chose passion over paycheck. 

“My mom was like, ‘Follow your dreams. You're young. We support you. So why would you not take it?’” she recalls. "I was like, okay, Mom, thank you. I love you, and I took the internship, and I haven't regretted it since."

At Nachtlab, Jasmin cut her teeth in the events space, and drew inspiration from the organization’s history when thinking about her next moves. 

“They would always talk about how back in the day, Nachtlab was so cool," she reminisces. "They had like a swinging bed in the lobby, a recording studio downstairs, and their own little radio show.”

That last bit especially planted a seed in Jasmin’s head. "I was like, 'Oh my God, I would love to have a radio show one day,'" she recalls. "I was thinking, like, one day when I'm 35 or 45—it would be so cool to have a radio show and I could, like, play music because I love sharing music.” She'd dismissed it as a distant, decades-away dream until she spotted that Slim Radio was looking for new broadcasters.

"I'm like, 'Oh, wait, this can be now. This could happen right now,'" she realized. She successfully pitched her show to Slim, and just like that, ‘Imagined Realities’ was born. The show ran from summer of 2023 till spring 2024, and blended her love of music with thought-provoking conversations about utopian visions and storytelling. 

"It was an opportunity to move beyond just critiquing issues and focus on imagining the realities I wanted to see," she explains. It allowed her to explore her creativity and share her ideas in a format that combined all her passions.

As she shared ‘Imagined Realities’ on the airwaves, Jasmin, fresh into her freelancing era after leaving Nachtlab, began contemplating the realities she wanted to create in Amsterdam. She started working at Sexyland, the hybrid restaurant and cultural center at IJplein, initially behind the bar and waitressing. But it didn't take long for her to recognize the venue's potential. 

"Sexyland has been such a supportive platform for me," she enthuses. "It's been so nice that I'm able to just start working there in a restaurant and a bar and end up organizing, like, three or four absolutely magnificent events with so much support from the team—time, energy, money."

Some of her Sexyland highlights include EMBODY, a concept Jasmin developed to connect artforms and "manifest a sense of well-being and connectedness with self and your community within the context of nightlife.”

She transformed the space by adorning Sexyland’s walls with an intimate collection of photographs from artist Carla Chichi, whose work invites viewers to explore their own vulnerability and embodied experience and vulnerability, and embrace their personal journeys of self-discovery. The evening kicked off with a live performance by Ethan Lx, complete with a kiddie pool and some razor blades (no one was harmed, except that the performer walked out with a freshly bald patch on their head), and attendees stayed till the wee morning hours, putting embodiment to practice by dancing to her curated DJ lineup. 

This past August at Sexyland, Jasmin organized a Pride Hangover event with several queer, PoC community leaders to wind down Amsterdam Pride Weekend. 

"We watched 'Slay,' which is a TV show created by Dutch ballroom to honor the Black and Brown trans community," she explains. "I thought it would be a beautiful Sunday come-down activity to watch it together with the community, while also maybe bringing some of the leaders of the community together to have a conversation around what it means to create safer spaces."

Jasmin's largest and longest-standing project has been her series of Clothes Swaps, which kicked off at Sexyland last September. The idea came from both personal necessity and a growing awareness of the pitfalls of fast fashion—an industry notorious for overproduction, environmental harm, and exploitative labor practices.

"I'd just started freelancing," she tells me. "I had some gigs but not that stable 9-to-5 money. I wanted new clothes without spending, and I felt guilty about fast fashion with all the climate and exploitation issues."

Vintage shopping in Amsterdam wasn't the solution. "Same price as new stuff—sweetie, why?" she laughs. Living with her roommate Alex, they began raiding each other’s closets to create new outfits and styles for themselves. 

"She would take things I never wore—relics of 2015 that need to stay there—and she'd style them super cute," Jasmin says. "It works even though I wasn't inspired by them. We have so much clothing, and we just need to redistribute it."

She realized they weren't alone. "If I can do this with my friends, I can do this with a bunch of strangers," she thought. "Let’s see if we can pull it off." The first clothes swap took place at Sexyland last September and was a hit. "The dopamine was so high," she recalls. "People walked away with bags of clothes. I was so happy. I'm still wearing clothes from that first swap."

The success led to second and third editions, including a collaboration with Studio Strip, the Noord-based creative collective. "They're party people, but they crave not just parties anymore—connection," she explains. "It's nice on the dance floor, but right now that's the only space to meet people and talk to strangers and let down the mask. Both Strip and I realize we need new landscapes to facilitate this."

This quarter, she's collaborating with Queer City for a clothes swap at Pakhuis de Zwijger on October 29th. "It's going to be cute and cozy," she says. "Decolonizing fashion with talks and performances, then a clothes swap and fashion show after raiding each other's closets. We'll get creative, get crazy, feel beautiful, and celebrate ourselves and each other."

Through all these projects, Jasmin is dedicated to creating spaces where people can connect and be themselves—especially off the dancefloor, which so many see as the only place where their masks can come off. Jasmin, no stranger to the dancefloor herself, wants to take those connections, sparked in nightlife, and cultivate more profound, meaningful and impactful relationships during the daylight hours.

"We don’t need to be dependent on these huge structures," she says. "We can do a lot ourselves if we just connect."

As for ‘Imagined Realities’, it's been off the air while Jasmin has been busy crafting new experiences for us. But fans of the show might be in luck. "I’m itching for it again," she admits. "Every once in a while, I’m listening to music and I'm like, 'Oh, I want to do a show.' People ask me, 'When are you gonna do it again? I miss it.' And I'm like, 'I miss it too, you guys!'"

She hints at a possible return this winter. "I'm hoping that next season, like in January or something, I'll have a little more mental space and actual time," she says. "I really, really love doing it."

In the meantime, Jasmin is keeping busy professionally and personally. She has a knack for finding a way into the best parties–successfully slipping into several of ADE’s biggest events (Peggy Gou’s sunrise Loft set in 2023, and Raum’s notorious weekender just last week) thanks to her unique blend of charm that works on just about any bouncer in the city, and willingness to seize the moment (or, a wristband that almost looks like the ones being sold at the venue). Jasmin’s also cropping up more backstage, with recent ventures in stage managing taking her from No Art Festival to Thuishaven. 

It's clear that Jasmin's presence on Amsterdam's creative scene, as a producer and a partaker, is substantial and multiplying. It's challenging to capture all that she's involved in, but perhaps that's part of the intrigue. Following Jasmin isn't just about keeping up with her latest endeavors; it's an invitation to experience the city in new and meaningful ways—especially if you embrace her particular modes of vibrance, spontaneity, and passion for community-building. 

So, you might consider taking her friends' advice to 'Follow Jasmin', and discover an Amsterdam brimming with joy, serendipity, and the genuine connections she cultivates.