Here, we ask designers to take a selfie and give us an inside look at their life.
Age: 55
Occupation: Interdisciplinary Artist, Founder of Callidus Guild
Instagram: @callisguild
Hometown: Los Angeles
Studio Location: Williamsburg
Describe what you make: I create hand-crafted wallcoverings and surfaces that merge fine art with applied design. My studio, Callidus Guild, is an atelier where we transform ancient materials—plaster, marble dust, encaustic, resin, leaf, micaceous powders—through contemporary, often self-invented processes. Each surface is built with layers of gesture, texture, and light, designed to evoke an emotional response—whether awe, serenity, or glamour. In essence, I make walls that feel alive: luminous, tactile, and resonant with history, craft, and poetry.
The most important thing you’ve designed to date: My life.
Describe the problem your work solves: My work addresses the void left by mass production and the homogenization of space. In a world often dominated by flat, disposable surfaces, I strive to bring back depth, meaning, and tactility. Each Callidus Guild surface is a reminder that walls can hold memory, history, and spirit—that materials themselves can speak. By layering ancient processes with contemporary experimentation, I offer designers and clients something irreplaceable: surfaces that are at once timeless and visionary, capable of transforming a space into an experience.
Share the project you are working on now: Our latest collection Fleurs du Bien draws inspiration from my own garden and the quiet, enduring beauty of florals. This new body of work channels joy, memory, and metamorphosis into every gesture and reconnects us to the natural world. This collection has a playful exuberance to it that we want to bring into interiors. Each piece feels more like a painting than a wallpaper.
What you absolutely have to have in your studio: Music, snacks, art, vibes, etc.
Materials, Light, Tools, Joy, Harmony. Listening to music is often how I set the tone for the day.
What you do when you’re not working: Garden, cook, write, draw, spend time with loved ones, get out in NYC to enjoy all it’s vibrant culture.
Sources of creative envy (dead or alive): I don’t really envy the creativity of others, I am more inspired or moved, and learning.
The distraction you want to eliminate: Mind chatter.
Concrete or marble? Both, like Scarpa.
High-Rise Or Townhouse? I am a country and city mouse.
Remember Or Forget? Always remember, sometimes forget.
Aliens Or Ghosts? Aliens.
Dark Or Light? Entre Chien et Loup.
