When Atlanta Style and Design Magazine chose “Looming Large” as the title for their Fall 2025 feature on Debby Gomulka, they captured something essential about this moment in her career.
After 25 years of building a reputation for sophisticated, story-driven interiors, Gomulka is experiencing what can only be described as a creative renaissance—one that extends far beyond traditional interior design into textile innovation, international advocacy, and a bold rejection of the industry’s mass-produced status quo.
The feature arrives at a pivotal time. Gomulka is relaunching her textile collection fifteen years after its original debut, preparing for a gala at the Metropolitan Museum as a nominee for the White House Historical Association’s National Council, and serving as the US Ambassador for an international design movement that’s challenging the very foundations of how we think about interiors. It’s a convergence of recognition that reflects not just professional success, but a steadfast commitment to a design philosophy that refuses to compromise.
From Moroccan Casbah to Textile Collection: The Birth of a Vision
The story behind Debby Gomulka’s textile line reads like the plot of a design fairytale—except every detail is true. In the early years of her career, fresh from establishing her firm in 2000, Gomulka landed what seemed like an impossible project: a 12,000-square-foot historic home dating to the 1840s that had fallen into such disrepair it had been carved into eight separate apartments.
Most people thought her client was “crazy enough to buy this house,” as Gomulka recalls, describing it as “a derelict project.”
But the client had a vision rooted in childhood memories. She had traveled to Morocco as a young girl, and those experiences had left an indelible impression. As Gomulka and her client worked to develop a design theme for the massive restoration project, the client brought a book filled with Moroccan imagery to their meeting.
“She showed it to me and she said, ‘This is what I love,'” Gomulka remembers. The client wanted more than superficial decoration—she wanted walls that looked ancient, that transported visitors to a Moroccan Casbah.
Gomulka rose to the challenge with characteristic thoroughness. She brought in an artist from Manhattan to fly south and execute authentic Moroccan techniques on the walls.
The collaboration was intensive, requiring hours of phone consultations (this was before Zoom) as they selected paint colors and developed the palette.
“We turned it into a Moroccan Casbah, one of the rooms, not the whole house, just the kitchen,” she explains. The result was so immersive that visitors felt they had stepped into another world entirely.
But something unexpected happened during this process. As Gomulka spent months immersed in Moroccan colors, patterns, and design motifs, a creative spark ignited. “From that vision for this client’s home, my textile was born,” she says.
“So, I literally took that vision I created for that client and moved it into a textile design. So, all of those paint colors and chips that we were creating for that design, a lot of my colors are the same, the textile.”
The design itself carries a personal significance that makes it truly unique. The central motif didn’t come from a fabric showroom or magazine—it came from one of Gomulka’s own unused logo designs from fifteen years earlier.
“One of the designs that I did not pick then became the motif for the textile design,” she reveals. “It truly came from my design, my creation.”
This authenticity proved to be the collection’s greatest strength. Working in collaboration with NC State’s Wilson College of Textiles, Gomulka developed the line for both home goods and fashion.
The textiles were featured in upscale boutiques throughout North and South Carolina, earning recognition for their distinctive aesthetic and quality craftsmanship.
Now, in 2025, Gomulka is relaunching the collection with renewed energy and an enhanced commitment to sustainability. She’s partnering with the Baxter Mill Archive in South Carolina, a historic textile mill resource, to produce the fabrics with eco-conscious methods.
The relaunch includes a collaboration with New York designer Frank Cassata for a fashion show that bridges interior design and couture fashion . It’s this kind of interdisciplinary thinking that has become a hallmark of Gomulka’s approach—proving that great design transcends traditional boundaries.
Rejecting Fast-Food Design: A Modern-Day Michelangelo’s Mission
The Atlanta Style and Design feature arrives as Debby Gomulka steps into a larger platform for her design philosophy. In July 2025, she was appointed US Ambassador for F-IND (Forum of Innovative Design), an international organization dedicated to elevating authentic, creative interior design above the mass-produced trends that dominate today’s market.
It’s a role she’s uniquely qualified for, given her outspoken views on what’s happened to the design industry. “I amcalling it a fast- food design , a super-sized McDonald’s,” she says bluntly. “Go through the drive through and everybody gets the same thing. That’s just not what I do.”
This isn’t mere rhetoric. Gomulka has watched as Instagram and Pinterest have democratized design in ways that are both empowering and problematic.
While access to design inspiration has never been greater, she’s concerned about the homogenization of interiors and the rise of what she calls “Instagram designers who have no formal education.” The result is a landscape where “everything’s the same home design, Amazon Design Anybody can be a designer.”
Through F-IND, Gomulka and her international colleagues are pushing back against this tide. “We’re calling ourselves the modern day Michelangelo’s, because back in the day, that’s what they did,” she explains.
“It was the Michelangelo’s, the Da Vinci’s, the painters, the sculptors, ancient architects. So, that’s where it comes from. That’s where the essence of my design philosophy comes from.”
The comparison to Renaissance masters isn’t hyperbole when you understand the philosophy behind it. Just as Michelangelo and Da Vinci were commissioned to create unique works of art tailored to specific patrons and spaces, Gomulka believes contemporary designers should approach each project as a bespoke creation.
“Interior design has been around since the beginning of time going back to Egypt,” she notes, pointing out that the craft has always been about creating meaningful, intentional spaces—not reproducing trending looks.
Her mission with F-IND includes working with design students to encourage them to “push your creativity” rather than falling into the “cookie cutter trap.” She’s writing an article with the organization’s founder and an Austrian professor to articulate this vision more broadly.
The goal is to educate consumers about the value of authentic creative interior design and to establish that, like any professional service, quality design should be compensated fairly.
This advocacy work is being recognized at the highest levels. In August 2025, Gomulka was nominated to serve on the National Council for the White House Historical Association—a nonpartisan organization founded by Jackie Kennedy that stewards the history and preservation of the White House.
She’s been invited to the association’s gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art this fall, a recognition that aligns perfectly with her historic preservation background and her belief that great design serves cultural and educational purposes beyond aesthetics.
Sophisticated Yet Simply Modern: The Debby Gomulka Aesthetic
So what does “sophisticated yet simply modern” actually look like in practice? For Gomulka, it’s about fusion—blending her background in historic preservation and art history with the needs of contemporary living.
“My background is historic preservation, and so a lot of my design comes from art history,, history of buildings, culture,” she explains. The art and culture is woven into my designs so that it then can be applied to modern day living.”
This approach means a project can be brand new construction while still incorporating elements that give it depth and character. “It doesn’t necessarily have to always be a historic project with an old building,” she notes.
Instead, she fuses in elements tailored to each client’s story—their travels, their passions, their personal history. The result is interiors that feel collected and meaningful rather than catalog-ordered.
What sets Gomulka apart is her versatility. Her portfolio ranges from historic preservation projects to coastal farmhouse designs, yet each achieves what she calls a “timeless design.” She doesn’t impose a signature style; instead, she starts with the client’s narrative and builds from there.
This client-centric approach means taking time to understand not just what clients want, but who they are—observing their fashion choices, learning about their travels, discovering their emotional connections to colors and objects.
The work that results from this process stands in stark contrast to mass-market design. “It’s very custom. It goes beyond custom. It’s definitely tailor-made just for that specific client project,” she says.
This often means incorporating handcrafted elements, artisan-made pieces, and materials of superior quality—the kinds of choices that give a space soul and longevity.
Looming Larger Than Ever
As Debby Gomulka looks back on 25 years in business, the advice she offers is the same she gives her interns and students: “Just exactly what I teach my students today, my interns, don’t be afraid to push your creativity. Go for it.
You’ve got a creative idea, you’ve got a vision. Don’t try to fit in. It’s creative. Creative is abstract. It’s not what everybody else is doing.”
It’s advice she’s clearly taken to heart. From that childhood growing up among Grosse Pointe’s landmark mansions to today’s international platform, Gomulka has consistently chosen the more challenging, more authentic path.
The Atlanta Style and Design feature captures her at a moment when that choice is being validated—through the textile relaunch, through her ambassadorship, through nominations to prestigious councils.
But perhaps most importantly, it captures a designer who has found her voice and is using it to advocate for something larger than any single project.
In an era of fast fashion and faster design, Debby Gomulka is making the case for taking time, honoring craft, and creating spaces that tell genuine stories. That’s a vision worth looming large.
