Billy Cotton is a New York–based designer whose work slips (seemingly) effortlessly between interiors, furniture, and objects, always guided by an unusually human understanding of how spaces make us feel. Schooled initially as a historian before discovering design at Pratt Institute, Billy brings a deep cultural literacy to everything he does – from rooms layered with memory and warmth to rigorously pared-back, meditative spaces.His career has taken him from early freelance projects for pop cultural heavyweights to deeply personal collaborations with artists and craftspeople, and his work resists easy categorization, moving fluently between maximalism and restraint.In this conversation, part of our Layered Lives series, Billy traces the origins of his aesthetic back to childhood encounters with art, architecture, and collecting, reflects on the emotional responsibility of design, and explains why chairs, color, and craft remain central to his thinking. It’s a portrait of a designer driven not by style for style’s sake, but by curiosity, empathy, and a lifelong fascination with how we live.
