Meet Victoria Valentinas

We recently connected with Victoria Valentinas and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Victoria , appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
When asked where I get my resilience from, I must do some reflecting on which situations have forced me to be resilient. The definition of resilience according to Oxford Languages is “the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.” I don’t believe that ‘toughness’ happens overnight but is rather something that is developed from layers of strong foundations. I would be nothing if it weren’t for my amazing parents who raised me to work hard and persevere. Growing up in a small family business, I learned by example that success doesn’t come to those who are lucky, but rather to those who put in the effort and do the hard work. As young as a child I began to learn about the “ability to spring back into shape” from my first notable “knock-down” when I got hit in the mouth with a baseball in 5th grade. My mom said I should play with the boys instead of sitting on the sidelines at my little sister’s games, and even though I ended up getting hit it became one of the beginning layers of foundation to toughen me up as days later I had to audition for a dance company with a swollen face unable to smile but, my resiliency landed me the spot on the team; and I am constantly reminded to never sit on the sidelines. Fast forward to eighteen years later, I was in the midst of planning my wedding and building a house when the company I was working for filed for bankruptcy and I was soon to be out of a job, was this terrible timing, yes; however, was I going to get through it, yes, I had no other choice! As the wedding week was about to arrive so was Hurricane Florence, which was challenging me to be flexible with the plans I had dreamt of for years, after our entire wedding party’s flights were cancelled. The rehearsal was being canceled due to safety concerns, the generators were arriving for the DJ and the hotel reception hall was planning to cook steaks on a grill one at a time due to most of their staff evacuating, we had to be not only realistic about the situation at hand but resilient as we needed to cancel and reschedule and replan a wedding that took one year to plan within 48 hours. With the support of family and friends and an optimistic attitude I was able to let go of the situation and be resilient to come up with a solution that involved us going on our honeymoon as planned and coming back to get married a month later. It was these unexpected experiences that fully prepared me for the world pandemic that we all faced in 2020 with Covid-19. My job at the time was eliminated due to travel and retail coming to a halt, and I was traveling 90% of the time to design retail spaces. After doing some deep soul searching of what I have always wanted to do, I thought back to the family business. The passion for entrepreneurship was always in my blood, and to one day have my own interior design business. It was time to quickly recover from a difficult situation and to take the leap to follow my dreams! Over the past 3 years, there have been bumps in the road, one so big it landed me sandwiched between two cars in a serious accident. If I have learned anything from these experiences, it is what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger and resiliency is the foundation of what has made me and VLV Designs who I am and what it is today!

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
Want to live a stress-free beautiful life? We take ordinary spaces and make them specialty places!
We take ideas to the next level, creating functional beauty in the most unique form.
We believe in bringing your personal vision to life by gathering your favorite things while adding new pieces to create a beautiful harmonious design.
We are full service interior design to make your life easy!
Not sure what we do?
Behind all the creative designing we are on the road sourcing, picking up, delivering, painting, taping, negotiating, handling logistics, scheduling, quoting, installing, solving problems, and doing whatever we can to make your life easier because our goal is to provide you with Livable Luxury Design! Located in both Charlotte and Pinehurst North Carolina with year-round access to the largest furniture market in the world, it is our goal to source and implement the best design solutions for your project needs.
I am the President and Principal Designer of VLV Designs. As a graduate of High Point University’s Interior Design and Studio Art programs, I celebrate design in everything. With over a decade of experience in the home industry, including time spent with brands such as HGTV HOME, Bassett, Thomasville, Bernhardt & Christopher Guy to name a few, I am driven by my passion for all things design. From designing furniture, to bringing the perfect space together, to painting wall murals and canvases, my passion for art and design is evident in all of my work; and my dedication to the customer experience is second to none!
VLV Designs is a full-service interior design and custom art company, specializing in specialty room design packages, custom bedding and window treatments, faux finish paint treatments, and custom art, whether it be on canvas or on walls. Above all, I am passionate about providing my clients with the best quality and service. To do so, I pride myself on partnering with other local small businesses in North Carolina and recommending products that are of the best value, made in the USA. VLV Designs has an amazing library of resources, including over 1,000 samples in the VLV Designs studio, and we bring those samples directly to our clients, so they don’t have to go from store to store.
I am known to be a great listener when it comes to hearing my clients’ needs and it is always my goal to bring them ideas that are uniquely outside the box; something they hadn’t thought of themselves. After all, that is why they hired VLV Designs! If you are surfing Instagram, you will most likely find me standing on a ladder, doing a faux gold leafing paint treatment on a ceiling, installing a gallery wall for a fun family room, working with our install crew to hang custom draperies, or at the easel painting a golf or beach landscape in super speed!
The possibilities are endless at VLV Designs, and we are known for bringing design dreams to life. That is what I love most about my job; getting to know clients in their most personal space, their home. As a VLV Designs client, I want to get to know you and what is important to you.  I want to know how I can design a functional space to make your life less stressful and to create a beautiful environment that encourages you to live your best life.
Most recently I have been named 40 under 40 for Home Furnishing’s Business Magazine and I am also very involved in my local community from mentoring rising stars in the home industry to doing pro-bono work for local non-profit organizations it is my passion to pay it forward all while making the community a more beautiful place to live.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Interior Design: after over a decade of experience in interior design from commercial to residential spaces I am an expert in all things design, specializing in spaces that are heavily focused on furnishings, textiles, and art.

Painting: from a hobby to a passion to a profession after studying studio art I now pride myself as being the go-to in her region for custom art, faux finishes, and custom murals. I love discovering a client’s vision and then bringing that vision to the canvas, wall, or ceiling!

People Skills: I am a passionate people person and I pride myself on my relationship skills to better understand my client’s needs and be able to take the stress out of making their house a home.

We’ve all got limited resources, time, energy, focus etc – so if you had to choose between going all in on your strengths or working on areas where you aren’t as strong, what would you choose?
I think it is important to go all in our strengths but to also focus on investing efforts on improving areas we aren’t as strong in to make us more well-rounded and to help the overall business succeed. Part of going all in our strengths is identifying the weaknesses and learning how to make them stronger even if that means delegating and or hiring the experts that will elevate your business and in turn give you more time to invest in the areas you thrive in. Some of the best decisions I have made as a small business owner have been investing in a bookkeeper and accountant however, through the relationship and process I have learned a wealth of knowledge about my business and have become fully aware of my processes, hiring these two have just allowed me to focus more time on what I was destined to do which is both art and design. The same goes for hiring my window treatment installers and the marketing and PR agency that I work with; two heads are better than one and to have a broader perspective on the business is something that I am truly grateful for.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
Daria Amato Caitlin Antje Catherine Nguyen Jay Sinclair

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