Jessica Olsson is the Swedish wife of Dirk Werner Nowitzki, a retired German professional basketball player who played for the Dallas Mavericks of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Olsson, a native of Gävle, grew up with her twin younger brothers, Marcus and Martin Olsson, who are both footballers. In February 2010, she met Nowitzki at a charity event, and two years later, in July 2012, they married. They currently live in Dallas with their three children. She worked as an associate director at the Goss-Michael Foundation art gallery in Dallas at the time of her marriage.
Childhood and Adolescence
Jessica Olsson was born in Gävle, Sweden, to a Swedish father and a Kenyan mother around 1980 or 1981. Marcus and Martin Olsson, her younger twin siblings, were born on May 17, 1988. They both went on to become professional football players. Marcus is presently a midfielder and left back for Derby County, an English team that competes in the EFL Championship. He has played in two exhibition matches for Sweden. As a result, he can continue to represent Kenya if he so choose. Martin, a left back, plays for Swansea City in the Championship and has also represented Sweden at the national level.
Olsson and her siblings were raised in a loving family. Their parents pushed them to follow their dreams. While her boys spent their days on the football field, she developed a strong passion for art. She was equally intrigued about her Swedish and Kenyan ancestors. When Olsson married Nowitzki, she worked as an associate director at the Goss-Michael Foundation art gallery in Dallas. It’s unclear whether she’s still associated with the group. She participates in a variety of charity and fundraising events on a regular basis.
Dirk Nowitzki’s relationship
Jessica Olsson and Nowitzki met at a charity event in February 2010 in support of the Sports for Education and Economic Development (SEED) Project. It didn’t take long for the two to begin a relationship. Nowitzki has always been tall, as he comes from a sporting background. He started out playing handball and tennis before switching to basketball. From 1994 to 1998, he was a professional basketball player for the German club DJK Würzburg. Despite the fact that DJK was a club in Germany’s second-tier league, Nowitzki’s extraordinary improvement as a player quickly drew significant attention. He joined the Dallas Mavericks in 1998 and went on to become one of the most recognized basketball players of today after a rough first season. He is largely considered as one of the all-time great power forwards. He appeared in 15 NBA Playoffs with the Mavericks and won the 2011 NBA Championship with them. In 2007, he was named NBA Most Valuable Player, and in 2011, he was named NBA Finals Most Valuable Player. In addition, Nowitzki was a key player in Germany’s bronze-medal-winning FIBA World Championship campaign in 2002 and silver-medal-winning EuroBasket 2005 campaigns.
On the red carpet at the ESPYS Awards on July 13, 2011, Olsson and Nowitzki made their first public appearance together. They were engaged on Valentine’s Day in 2012 and married lawfully in their Dallas home on July 20, 2012, in front of State District Judge Craig Smith. After that, they traveled on their honeymoon to the Caribbean. On August 8, 2012, they performed a secret wedding ceremony there, with only close friends and family members in attendance.
In July 2012, the pair married in their respective countries, honoring each other’s roots with traditional German and Kenyan wedding ceremonies. In Kenya, they staged a Kikuyu wedding, in which the entire community is informed about the engagement and the bride and groom’s families meet to discuss ruracio (dowry). According to Kenyan custom, the groom is the one who provides the dowry to the bride’s family. It was mostly symbolic in Nowitzki’s case. Olsson’s family received a few Kenyan shillings from him. The wedding took place in Nanyuki, Olsson’s mother’s hometown. Olsson was not born or raised in Kenya. As a result, she found the ceremony to be a new experience as well. She wore a traditional Kikuyu costume, while the groom was clothed in a dark brown traditional outfit with orange tints.
In July 2013, Olsson gave birth to their first child, a daughter called Malaika. On March 24, 2015, their son, Max, was born. Morris, their youngest son, was born on November 11, 2016, to the couple. Olsson and Nowitzki don’t want to raise their kids only in Dallas. They want children to be exposed to a variety of cultures and languages so that when they are adults, they can make informed decisions about where they will live and what professions they will pursue.