Taya Valkyrie Reveals How Pandemic Eventually Led To Her New Clothing Line

In an interview with Wrestling Inc, Taya Valkyrie spoke about how creative frustrations during the COVID-19 pandemic led to her new LOCA clothing line. Here are highlights:

On being creatively frustrated during the pandemic: “I’ve always been a huge fan of fashion and I think it’s pretty evident in my choices of what Taya wears on TV and also backstage segments. I’ve been a fashion student for the last little while which I don’t really talk about that often because it’s such a new thing. I was doing class online while still working and doing everything else. I decided to go to school because I wanted to start my own lifestyle brand but with everything that happened over the last few months that had me at home thinking about it a lot, I decided to do something about it. This has really been a creative outlet for me because I’m one of those people that if I’m not making or creating or doing something creative, I feel like I’m lost. I needed an outlet for that and this really has been that.”

On how she’s running her business: “With the help of Lapel Yeah in LA, I order through them so it’s been very time-consuming. Shipments and mail has been very slow over the last few months but I’ve somehow managed to pull it off. I finally have my own office space at our house so I’m not all over the place and driving my husband crazy. It’s been really fun. It’s been a lot of work. I think it’s obvious that I care so much about this and it’s another outlet for me to express myself.”

On how she’s adapted to a limited schedule: “It was really rough and for anyone that says it’s fun to be at home, it’s not [laughs]. I’m sure that everybody deals with these kinds of situations differently but it was hard on me mentally at first. I felt depressed and sad as I felt like I was going 200 mph before this happened, then everything came to an abrupt stop. I felt lost a little bit because everything I had going on – other TV projects, wrestling, even school – the first month, month-and-a-half was really rough for me. But I started to come around and at the tapings from a few weeks ago, it was the first time I wrestled since March 13th for Bar Wrestling. So, it was a looooong time off. It was a little rough but I pulled up my bootstraps and got it together. But I’ve been working out at home and LOCA has given me a creative outlet to keep my brain occupied. I’m just glad that we’re able to do some TV and I really am positively looking into the future as to things going back to normal slowly but surely.”

On living in Los Angeles: “I mean, all I know of living in LA is with John [laughs]. We’re just here for each other and there’s so much uncertainty. I feel that every couple that is at home stuck with each other for 24 hours a day is, at certain points, going, ‘Oh my God! What is going on?’ But it really helps to have each other and we got a new puppy. So, that was occupying our time and now we have two fur babies. We’re just trying to help each other out mentally and physically and trying to keep each other motivated and occupied.”