A bétyle is a sacred stone, a votive object revered in ancient Greece and Rome. Cazenave de la Roche says some of these raw stones were believed to be meteorites that had fallen from the sky. Two designers have borrowed the name for their Marseille interior design practice, and the idea shapes how they work.
Carla Romano and Nicolas Cazenave de la Roche founded Betyle Studio in 2025. For them, every project is a puzzle. They study it slowly, uncover how it wants to unfold, and then balance restraint with bold design choices.
The two designers share more history than their partnership might suggest. Both have Vietnamese roots on their fathers’ side. Romano grew up in Marseille and spent summers in Saint-Florent. Cazenave de la Roche split his childhood between Paris and Corsica. Both knew the fast rhythm of the city and the slower pull of nature.
They met as students at L’École Beuve in Paris. Soon after graduating, they decided to work together. Romano chose Marseille, her hometown, as their base. She calls it a city in transformation, with much still to be invented, and the studio’s work reflects that in its marseille interiors.
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Their first joint project was not a room or a building. It was a podcast. The pair retold key episodes from the lives of Gio Ponti and Jean-Michel Frank. Cazenave de la Roche says the series taught them to work closely with material and to weave story and research into one thread. That habit, linking history with the present, became the foundation of the practice.
How the marseille interior design practice works
Betyle Studio begins every commission with the building itself. The team reads its history, its architectural details and the way light moves through it. Romano says each project starts with archives, with research into the trades that once occupied the site and with the surrounding neighbourhood.
The studio’s Le Figuier shows this method at work. It converted an agricultural outbuilding dating from 1820 into a home in Marseille. The walls were thick and windowless, and they could not be altered, so the studio built inside them. Archival photographs guided the choice of materials. Old feeding troughs gave way to a metal washbasin, and farm hooks became flower holders and hangers.
The studio keeps returning to a set of reference points. These include Pierre Chareau’s functionalism and the glass blocks of his Maison de Verre, the core furniture principle of Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House, Gae Aulenti’s Palazzo Pucci in Florence and the wood-clad interiors of Frank Lloyd Wright. Each one informs how the duo handles structure, light and surface.
A talisman for every project
Arcane 17, a restaurant on rue Charlot in the Marais, takes its name from the Star, card 17 of the Tarot de Marseille. The studio also designed a new series of stores for the leather goods and accessories brand Leo et Violette. For Arcane 17, the talisman is the Star. For Leo et Violette, it is a tuning fork, the brand’s emblem. It comes from co-founder Violette Sanchez’s early love of opera singing.
Romano describes the process in plain terms. “Every place is unique, and every place has its talisman, which we search for.” At Le Figuier, the symbol was a large fig tree in the garden, which gave the farmhouse its name. Once the team identifies the symbol, the rest of the project is tuned to it.
Furniture carries as much weight as the architecture. Cazenave de la Roche says the studio works as interior architects and curators at once. Whether custom-made or carefully sourced, a piece is never decorative. At Le Figuier, a structure of okoume wood and glass organises the whole house. At Arcane 17, a stainless-steel tube bar rises like a prow and turns the open kitchen into an arena.
The Arcane 17 interior, designed for owners with Catalan roots, reinterprets the Iberian tavern rather than copying it, according to Romano and Cazenave de la Roche. The space is clad in ebonised panelling, and the bar top is inlaid with marquetry slabs showing shooting stars and a cartoonish lobster. Classic bentwood chairs sit beside timber tables, and a red banquette in one corner nods to Parisian bistros. A Marseille carpenter, a frequent collaborator, made all of the joinery to order. Local studio Come Clerino designed the plaster sconces, which loosely resemble elongated seashells.
The studio prefers simple materials and new ways to finish them. The designers avoid a picture-perfect surface. They leave room for imperfection, which they see as the trace of artisanal work. “We prefer character to perfection,” they say.
Staying relevant in a crowded field, the duo argue, means ignoring trends. Their marseille interior design practice starts with the past of a building, a neighbourhood or a craft. They work with local artisans, a choice they describe as both ecological and a way of reconnecting with traditional know-how. Function comes first, and form follows from it. “That is what makes things last.” Readers can follow the studio’s work at betylestudio.com.
Source: wallpaper.com
Frequently asked questions
Who founded Betyle Studio and when was it established?
Betyle Studio was founded in 2025 by designers Carla Romano and Nicolas Cazenave de la Roche. The two are based in Marseille, where the studio practices interior design.
What does the name Betyle refer to?
A bétyle is a sacred stone, a votive object revered in ancient Greece and Rome. Some of these raw stones were believed to be meteorites that had fallen from the sky.
How does Betyle Studio begin a new interior design project?
Betyle Studio begins every commission with the building itself, studying its history, architectural details, and the way light moves through it. Romano says each project also starts with archives, research into the trades that once occupied the site, and the surrounding neighbourhood.
What is the talisman Betyle Studio looks for in each project?
The studio believes every place has a talisman, a central symbol that it searches for before designing. Once that symbol is identified, the rest of the project is tuned to it, such as the Star for the Arcane 17 restaurant and a tuning fork for Leo et Violette.
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