Designer Olivia von Halle talks silk pyjamas, Coco Chanel and Shanghai

"My husband Hugo and I married very young, we had only known each other for a year but often discussed how wonderful it would be to live abroad. I suggested Russia, Brazil, India or China - he vetoed all but China. It all happened very quickly and three months later we were in Shanghai and enrolled at Jiaotong University to study Mandarin. It is pretty challenging and I wish I could speak better Mandarin than I do.

We had so much fun there, and I made lots of Chinese girlfriends during those 21/2 years. I had studied fashion management at Leeds University and worked in trend forecasting for The Future Laboratory before moving to Shanghai [in 2008] and did a few projects for them and WGSN [also a trend consultancy].

I grew up on a farm and as a child I only had a school uniform and my riding kit to wear because my mother hates shopping - but we had a wonderful dressing-up box of my grandmother's and aunts' vintage clothes and I would wear those to parties. I once cut up my grandmother's original '20s flapper dress - which I never forgave myself for doing. I am hopeless at wearing casual clothes and love getting dressed up in long dresses - any excuse.

While living in Shanghai I found this amazing tailor. I am six feet tall and when I walked into fashion shops the assistants would say: 'too big, too fat!'. I could see that pyjamas were going to become a big trend and so I got my tailor to make me a couple of pairs in silk. I wore them for my 25th birthday party, to dinners, even walking our dog. I dressed them up, dressed them down and gave them as presents to friends. They adored them and I returned from a trip to England with a huge order list.

My tailor gulped and said, 'I do have other clients'. So I thought maybe this is something I could do properly and set up a brand. I always thought my husband's surname von Halle would make a pretty good brand name.