Valentina Gembressi

Valentina Gembressi is a legend in the fashion industry and has been designing for years. According to Valentina, she was designing gowns for Sophia Loren back when Lauren Sapphyre was mixing Armani with Polo and calling it her own scent. There is apparently no love lost between Valentina and Lauren, and it might have to do with the fact that they share an ex-husband in the late Andros Gembressi, and he died while married to Lauren! Little else is known about the nature of Valentina and Lauren's relationship, other than it's still contentious and it caused Valentina to pull her gowns from the Artemis campaign Lauren was launching for Sapphyre Cosmetics. This forced Lauren to look to fledgling designer Jenna Baldwin to design gowns for the campaign, which started the ball rolling on Lauren and Jenna's partnership in Baldwin Enterprises.

Valentina visited New York City in August 2008 when her daughter Rachel Marks was hospitalized from an encounter with her rival, Aviva Reynoso's alternate personality Ava that left Rachel with a hairline skull fracture. Valentina blamed Rachel's "nosy profession" for Rachel's injuries, and quickly scolded Shawn Marks for not keeping a closer watch over his little sister. Just as quickly as Valentina arrived, she was gone again, jetsetting across the globe to pursue her professional endeavors, but it's almost certain she'll return to respond to whatever trouble her kids might get themselves into!