Bill Willis: Neo-Moorish Revival

Bill Willis (1937–2009) arrived in Marrakech in the 1960s and never left. Born in Memphis, Tennessee, trained at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he developed a maximalist style that fused traditional Moroccan craftsmanship — tadelakt plaster, zellige, carved cedarwood — with theatrical scale and contemporary sensibility. His clients included J. Paul Getty Jr., Yves Saint Laurent, the Rothschilds, and Talitha Getty, whose rooftop photographs in Marrakech defined an era. Key interiors include Dar el-Hanch, Dar Tamsna, and the Getty palazzo. Willis didn't just decorate Morocco — he created the aesthetic vocabulary the world now recognizes as "Moroccan style."