Send us your feedback, thoughts or comments! Her water broke on the last day of filming The Great Gatsby. She had spent years inside Baz Luhrmann's creative world — researching Moulin Rouge in Paris, drinking absinthe in the streets, helping Catherine Martin dress Beyoncé, designing over 200 rugs for the Faena Hotel in New York. And she did all of it as the black sheep of a Lebanese-Australian family where everyone else became a doctor, a surgeon, or an engineer. She was the one who took the detour. As it turned out, the detour was the whole thing. Silvana Azzi Heras is the founder of House of Heras, a Sydney-based textile and interior design studio known for its maximalist, emotionally rich patterns rooted in folklore, flora, and cultural memory. Before founding her studio, she spent over a decade as head designer at Bazmark — Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin's creative company — working across Moulin Rouge, The Great Gatsby, La Bohème on Broadway, and The Get Down for Netflix. This is a conversation about what it means to follow an instinct when the world expects something safer from you. About heritage and culture as the raw material of a creative life. About the phone call that changes everything — and what happens when you finally say yes to yourself. About maximalism as a philosophy, not just an aesthetic. And about the strange, glittering, unglamorous work of building something entirely your own. In this episode, we explore: Growing up Lebanese-Australian: arriving in Sydney at age two, navigating identity, and returning to Beirut at 35 to understand her parents' resilienceBeing the 'black sheep' youngest of five — how family pressure shaped the long road to designStarting with a Bachelor of Welfare Studies, meeting her husband there, and going back to university as a mature-age student to study designThe phone call that changed everything: how a university lecturer put her name forward for Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin's studioLife inside Bazmark — researching Moulin Rouge! in Paris, drinking absinthe, walking the streets, and building a world from scratchThe Gatsby baby — her water breaking on the last day of filming The Great GatsbyGoing to Cannes twice and the Oscars twice, including helping Catherine Martin dress BeyonceDesigning over 200 rugs for the Faena Hotel New York, in collaboration with Peter MikicFounding House of Heras — filling a gap for maximalist, culturally rich design in a minimalist marketPre-visualisation as a design practice, the art of knowing when to stop, and why there are no shortcutsWhy this conversation matters In a design world that often rewards restraint and minimalism, Silvana Azzi Heras is doing something rarer: making work that holds memory, carries culture, and takes emotional risks. Her story is also a reminder that the creative path is rarely linear — that detours, late starts, and unexpected phone calls are often the beginning of something extraordinary. About the guest Silvana Azzi Heras is the founder and creative director of House of Heras, a Sydney-based design studio specialising in textiles, rugs, wallpaper, and interior design. She spent over a decade as head designer at Bazmark, the production company of Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin, working across some of the most visually ambitious films and productions of the past two decades. Her textile collections are stocked internationally and she has designed for the Faena Hotel New York, Designer Rugs, Milton & King, and CB2 in the United States. House of Heras is expanding into commercial interior design, and a new Axminster rug collection is due for release later in 2026. RESOURCES MENTIONED House of Heras website: houseofheras.com Instagram: @houseofheras and @silvanaazziheras Designer Rugs: designerrugs.com.au Milton & King wallpaper: miltonandking.comCB2 (US): cb2.com Faena Hotel New York: faena.com/new-york Peter Mikic: mikicdesign.com To get in touch with Build Beautiful or to follow us head to our socials: on Instagram on Facebook on LinkedIn If you'd like to be on the podcast, or want to collaborate with Build Beautiful feel free to contact us on buildbeautifulpodcast@gmail.com.
