Elizabeth Garouste and Mattia Bonetti, respectively French and Swiss-born, first crossed paths at the time Bonetti was re-branding Tilbury, the Garouste family shoe business.

Bonetti trained from a very early age (14 yrs old) as a textile designer in his native Lugano, refining his practice in Paris with established figures in the industry at the time such as Marcelle Callisti and Lilo Gross.

Garouste had an all-encompassing preparation during her time at the Académie Charpentier.

Their long collaboration and partnership began in 1980 when they worked jointly on the decor of the Privilège club, which was part of Le Palace, Paris’ most celebrated night club at the time.

Since then, they have worked both individually and jointly with a great complicity and a consciousness of the past and its transformation

Garouste and Bonetti deliberately ignored functionalism and standardization, favouring primitivism and an antiquated form of elegance instead.

Some of their eclectic projects include the interior design of Bernard Picasso’s Boisgeloup chateau and Christian Lacroix’s haute couture headquarters, as well as some design collections like “Les nouveaux barbares” produced by the gallery Néotù in Paris.