Design

Vikki Leftwich

Villa Vici

For Vikki Leftwich, the worlds of interior design, fashion, and furniture sales are all inextricably linked. At Villa Vici, all of those worlds combine to produce stunning designs and incredible spaces.

Leftwich opened her first furniture store in Covington 30 years ago. When she began working with architect George Hopkins on the design of the new building, Leftwich said it felt as if something had clicked into place.

“He started giving me plans to look over so I could edit their architectural plans,” she said. “They look at the exterior of the building, and we look at the interior floor plan for furniture. That’s how it all began.”

Leftwich said she had come across far too many floor plans where it was obvious the architect hadn’t thought about things like the direction a door opens or the placement of windows. With an entry into that world, Leftwich began designing and never looked back.

It soon became clear that Villa Vici’s furniture-based design melded perfectly within larger interior design projects.

“Because we have all the resources in our furniture company, we can do a whole house installation - including towels, sheets, bedding, window treatments - everything, and it’s just easy for the client to approve our presentation because they can actually come to the showroom and touch and feel everything,” she said.

Leftwich’s favorite project to date is a 13,000 square foot modern home she helped design in Folsom in 2009. She said that home, which just recently sold, was a joy to work on from start to finish.

“Villa Vici draws in all these clients from all over the country, because people travel to New Orleans so they can actually see the showroom,” she said. “We can do long distance projects. I finished one in Nebraska this year, one in Santa Fe. We can do projects anywhere as long as we have architectural plans.”

Before she was ever involved in furniture, Leftwich had her start in retail fashion, and there’s one thing she learned back then that carries through to her work today.

“With our furniture business, we pretty much choose the best of each factory to represent us,” she said. “In the fashion business, we never picked our second favorite style. We would go with only our favorite style jacket. We kind of do that with our products today.” – By Stephen Maloney