875: Window Treatment Friday: Vita Vygovska: The Straight Talk About Unstable Fabrics
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Release Date: 05/05/2023
916: Marilyn Watson-LaVergne: Clients Don’t Buy What We Do, They Buy What We Believe
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Marilyn Watson-LaVergne: Today on A Well-Designed Business I am joined Marilyn Watson-LaVergne. In her first career, Marilyn worked in marketing and public relations in New York City, witnessing the progression of branding for products and creative services, including interior design. Now a seasoned designer and owner of Marilyn LaVergne Interiors, Marilyn is teaching us that we can’t be all the things to all the people—and what to do instead. It all starts with identifying what you believe and finding your point of differentiation, because clients don’t buy...
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915: Power Talk Friday: Masha Koyen: 7 Mistakes Interior Designers Make on Their Website Messaging
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Masha Koyen: Welcome to a Well-Designed Business. It’s Power Talk Friday. Your website matters for so many reasons. It’s the gateway for how your clients get to know you, whether they trust you, and ultimately whether they ever contact you or not. My guest today, Masha Koyen, understands the importance of web copy. She is the founder of Content Vertical, a copywriting agency for the interior design industry. She helps designers and builders level up their brand and create messaging that connects, engages, and attracts their ideal audience. Masha has...
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914: Maria Leigh Palantino: Giving Yourself Permission to Launch an Interior Design Business
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Maria Palantino: Welcome to a Well-Designed Business. My guest today, Maria Leigh Palantino, came into the interior design industry as her second career. She started a career in fashion design then pivoted, and brought with her many skills from her fashion career that guide her philosophies, design style, and the way she cultivates a memorable experience for her clients. For Maria, it wasn’t just about being scared to take the plunge to start a new career. The real challenge was giving herself permission to leave behind not just her expertise but something she...
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913: Power Talk Friday: Terri Taylor: The Importance of Money Mindset in Charging Your Worth
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Terri Taylor: Welcome to a Well-Designed Business. For today’s sponsored show, I’m excited to welcome back Terri Taylor, creator of the Interior Design Business Academy – an education and coaching resource that provides a unique mix of business strategies and systems along with powerful positive mindset practices to help interior designers create meaningful success. Today, she is giving us an inside look at her upcoming Design Biz Summit—a 3-day event to help designers shake their mindset breaks and develop the skills to know their worth, charge it, and deliver on it....
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912: Jessica Bantom Continued: Take Action With the Six Habits of Culturally Competent Designers
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Jessica Bantom: Today on A Well-Designed Business, I am joined Jessica Bantom, interior designer, color consultant, and DEIB practitioner. This is Part Two of our conversation on how to become a culturally competent designer, and we are going even deeper. In this conversation, Jessica walks us through the six habits of a culturally competent designer—the same habits outlined in her new book, Design for Identity: How to Design Authentically for a Diverse World. Listen now to learn more about each of these habits and how you can incorporate them into your...
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911: Power Talk Friday: Jenna Gaidusek: Introducing Virtual Assistant Certification by Mydoma Studio
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Jenna Gaidusek: Today on A Well-Designed Business I am joined by Jenna Gaidusek, Director of Community and Education at Mydoma Studio. Jenna is a talented designer, founder of the Interior Design Playbook (formerly eDesign Tribe) Facebook community and creator of eDesign U, an online school dedicated to providing designers with the knowledge and tools needed to succeed in the eDesign industry. Jenna doesn’t want you to go it alone as a designer, which is why she joined forces with Mydoma Studio and created the Virtual Assistant Certification program. Listen now to...
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910: Christina Richardson: Expanding Your Design Business Internationally: What You Need to Know
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Christina Richardson: Welcome to A Well-Designed Business. Today we’re traveling outside the country. My guest Christina Richardson from Christina Richardson Interiors. Christina is a Scandinavian native who grew up on the charming coast of Northern Sweden. After moving to the U.S. with her husband and two daughters, Christina earned her interior design degree from the New York Institute of Art and Design. With 20 years of interior design under her belt from Sweden, Christina has learned a lot in the business of starting over in another country. She is here to share the...
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909: Power Talk Friday: Traci Connell: Normalizing Wealth With The Gloss
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Traci Connell: Today’s show is sponsored by Traci Connell’s free masterclass The Reveal which begins on September 11, 2023. Traci joins us once again to share all of the ways you can work with her in The Gloss, including her free masterclass The Reveal where she “reveals” all of the secrets and shortcuts she has learned in the interior design industry. This is a five-day, one-hour-per-day event. In The Reveal, you will learn the strategies Traci teaches designers to hit one million in revenue. This FREE course is for any interior designer who wants to reach the next level....
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908: Jessica Bantom: How to Be a Culturally Competent Design Activist & Why You Want to Be One (Part 1)
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Jessica Bantom: Today on A Well-Designed Business I am joined Jessica Bantom, interior designer, DEIB practitioner, and author of Design for Identity: How to Design Authentically for a Diverse World. This is the first part of a conversation about how to become a culturally competent designer. In this episode, part one of a two-part series, Jessica explains cultural competence is the ability to understand, interact with, and appreciate people of different backgrounds or belief systems that are different from your own. But she explains that it essentially comes down...
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907: Power Talk Friday: Manuela Keller and Philip McKay: Introducing 2 New Home Industry Trade Shows; Sun Shading Expo North America and R+T, Stuttgart Germany
A Well-Designed Business® | Interior Design Business Podcast
Today With Manuela Keller & Philip McKay: Today’s episode is sponsored by Messe Stuttgart, a German company that specializes in organizing trade shows, particularly for the home decor industry. They have been in the trade show business for more than 80 years, annually organizing around 60 shows and 100 conferences worldwide. Manuela Keller and Philip McKay are joining us to tell us all about two upcoming events: Sun Shading Expo 2023 and R+T 2024, which will both bring together the sun shading and textiles industries. Here, you will be able to maximize your time and meet...
info_outlineToday With Vita Vygovska:
Welcome to a Well-Designed Business. It’s Window Treatment Friday, which means I am joined by Vita Vygovska. Vita is the founder of Vitalia Inc. and a regular here on the podcasts. She is an expert in all things window treatments, and today Vita will share her knowledge of unstable fabrics to help us better understand the qualities of these linens, wools, open weaves, and anything viscose.
Window treatment professionals can’t guarantee the results when working with these fabrics, so neither should you as the designer. But don’t worry, Vita is here to eloquently help us navigate these temperamental textiles and give us the knowledge we need for better success.
Pick It Apart
[7:22] Vita and LuAnn discuss the battle of getting drapes to skim, or “kiss” the floor.
[17:53] Vita offers language to say no, without actually saying “no.”
[24:24] LuAnn talks about the importance of listening to the advice of your window treatment professional and passing the information along honestly to your clients.
[28:59] Vita advises interior designers on alternative fabrics to use in place of unstable ones.
[40:10] Vita suggests not only discussing the fabrics, but documenting the conversation and putting a disclaimer on projects with unstable fabrics because you can’t guarantee the outcome.
LuAnn Nigara and Vita Vygovska's Ah-Ha Moments
“We want to be good partners. We want to be there as your problem solvers, and as someone who brings value. But we also want to tell the truth, and we don't want to set anybody up for failure.” – Vita Vygovska
“These unstable fabrics‑being unstable because they're unpredictable‑whereas we don't exactly know as a workroomhow they are going to behave when we fabricate them… And so because these fabrics are so unpredictable, it is really difficult to guarantee any kind of specific result.” – Vita Vygovska
“Understand that once your window treatment professional confirms, or just tells you, for the first time that this probably isn't going to perform the way you and your client have the expectation to, then think of it as clear cut as the sofa blocking the walkway.” – LuAnn Nigara
“I'm going to tell you the truth over getting an order because I don't want just the order. I want the order and I want the project to be successful.” – LuAnn Nigara
“Tough conversations are always better had on the on the forefront‑up front‑before they become tough situations.” – Vita Vygovska
More About Vita Vygovska:
Vitalia Vygovska (Vita for short!), CWFP, MBA, is an award-winning window treatment specialist, author, speaker, and the LuAnn University instructor for Systems Driven Operations.
Connect with Vita Vygovska
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Other Shows Mentioned:
WTFP #134: Deb Barrett: Why Textiles Matter
AWDB #448: Window Treatment Friday: A New Series featuring Vita Vygovska and LuAnn Nigara
AWDB #456: Window Treatment Friday: Custom-Made vs Ready-Made Window Treatments
AWDB #462: Window Treatment Friday: Window Treatment Business Models, Part 1
AWDB #471: Window Treatment Friday: Window Treatment Business Models, Part 2
AWDB #748: Window Treatment Friday: Pricing Window Treatments: Understanding Margin vs. Markup
AWDB #761: Window Treatment Friday: Pricing Window Treatments: How to Ballpark the Numbers on the Fly
AWDB #775: Window Treatment Friday: Vita Vygovska: How Much Profit Can Designers Make on Window Treatments?
AWDB #815: Window Treatment Friday: Vita Vygovska: Mindset of Pricing Window Treatments
Other Resources Mentioned: