Step inside the Broadwick Soho Hotel in London and you’re instantly transported into another world, one that’s as fabulous and grandiose as it is comfortable and cozy. An eclectic mélange of design inspirations ranging from the Jazz Age to English eccentricity and disco, the result is Studio 54 meets your grandmother’s townhouse, and it’s all courtesy of interior designer Martin Brudnizki.

Brudnizki’s more-is-more approach has captured the global imagination. Following a maxim of creating experiences, he’s developed an instantly recognizable style that has transformed interiors into their own unique escapes, with an emphasis on private members’ clubs, hotels, bars and restaurants, along with a select number of residences. Referred to as “the master of the grand fantasy” by one of his clients, Brudnizki manages to achieve the rare design feat of balancing tradition and modernity for an effect that’s at once both elevating and familiar.

Layering colours, textures, patterns and styles always ties back to Brudnizki’s grand idea for a particular space. In hospitality projects, whether the look is a guest’s cup of tea or not is secondary to the emotional reaction it evokes. “People are drawn to it even though it might not be their personal style because it’s an event,” Brudnizki says. “You’re taken away for a couple of hours into a different universe to just have fun, which we need to do, especially today, I think.”

Although closely associated with contemporary English design, Brudnizki was raised in Stockholm by his German mother and Polish father. He moved to London in 1990 to study interior architecture and design at the American University in London, followed by a stint as a model before he began working with artist-designer Philip Michael Wolfson. In 2000 Brudnizki struck out on his own to launch his namesake studio, Martin Brudnizki Design Studio; 25 years on, MBDS now has offices in London and New York City staffed by more than 100 architects, lighting designers, product designers and art consultants. His highprofile projects — like the Beekman Hotel in New York, Le Grand Mazarin in Paris, Splendido in Portofino and Soho Beach House Miami have earned him innumerable accolades, including being named to the Architectural Digest 100 this past December. “You need to believe in what you’re doing. If you really believe it, eventually something will have to give,” Brudnizki says.

When it comes to realizing that sense of the fantastic, perhaps the best example in Brudnizki’s extensive portfolio is Annabel’s, the storied private members’ club on Berkeley Square, in London’s West End. When the British business tycoon Richard Caring acquired the property in 2007, he turned to Brudnizki to usher Annabel’s into its next incarnation while honouring its history as of one of the city’s first nightclubs, which had hosted the who’s who of 20th-century society, such as Frank Sinatra, Mick Jagger, Jack Nicholson and Diana, Princess of Wales.

Frequent creative collaborators, Caring and Brudnizki had previously partnered on high-profile dining projects like The Ivy and Sexy Fish, a swanky Mayfair seafood spot one reviewer described as “a restaurant designed to knock your silk socks into next week.” Annabel’s pushes Caring’s love of flora and fauna to lavish extremes — the all-pink-everything women’s restroom, its ceiling lined with handmade silk flowers, and the subterranean nightclub, a partyready homage to Milton’s “Paradise Lost” that’s lit by full-height palm trees made of brass and glass.

“It always starts with the client,” Brudnizki says of his approach to a new project, each with its own singular narrative. “The client is the inspiration because if we’re doing a hospitality project or even if we’re doing someone’s home, it’s really for them.”

Once they’ve established what needs to be achieved through the space, the storytelling begins, he says. “Is there a story with the building? Was it used for a special use, a hundred years ago, that can be woven into the story? Next, we look at the street outside, the neighbourhood, the town or the city, and then the country. From this, you can get a lot of information and begin to weave this narrative and create something fantastical.”

Torontonians don’t have far to travel to enter the Brudnizki universe. Café Boulud, chef Daniel Boulud’s French restaurant at the Four Seasons Hotel, was given the MBDS treatment in 2015. Ten years in, its warm, smart ambiance is as delightful as ever, thanks in no small part to Brudnizki’s overall rejection of design trends. “I don’t really follow trends because it’s the story that’s important. Our projects can take up to 10 years to fulfill, so if you [go after a trend], it’s going to be out of fashion. I always want to create something that is a classic that’s going to stand the test of time.”

Brudnizki was also behind Drake One Fifty, in Toronto’s Financial District — dining-focused outpost of Jeff Stober’s game-changing Drake Hotel on West Queen West. A reimagining of dining out for the Bay Street crowd, Drake One Fifty was a major downtown draw from 2013 to 2022. Through a collaboration with The Drake’s in-house design team, it combined Brudnizki’s signature colourful, sumptuous style with hip made-in-Toronto touches, including a Brothers Dressler-designed wood pergola and a mural and hand-drawn art by Rajni Perera at the Drake Minibar.

That attention to detail is critical in any MBDS project, whether it’s through a lampshade that’s as charming inside and out or through playful embellishment. “What I do think is important is achieving that sense of balance,” Brudnizki says. To that end, in 2015 Brudnizki launched And Objects, a collection of furniture and home décor intended to balance functionality with beauty. With a retail shop at Newson’s Yard, a design hub in central London, And Objects creates an opportunity for admirers of the MBDS style to bring a piece or two of that flair into their homes.

As his studio celebrates the milestone of its 25th birthday this year, Brudnizki seems ready to relax. With six hotels completed in the last 18 months, he’s fine with having a quiet year ahead. “I believe that more is not less,” Brudnizki says. “Be brave, make a big move. I think that’s just so important because you feel joy, you feel happy.”

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By Caitlin Agnew — *This article originally appeared in Insight: The Art Of Living Magazine – The Connection Issue.