Born to a Greek family in Ethiopia, the influential opera designer Stefanos Lazaridis was educated in Addis Ababa and Geneva, and came to London in 1962 to attend business school but studied design instead at the Central School of Speech and Drama. His first professional design was for Tennessee Williams's Eccentricities of a Nightingale (Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Guildford, 1967), and his first opera Carmen (Sadler's Wells Opera, 1970) for director John Copley.

His gold-encrusted Aida directed by John Copley (ENO, 1979), for which Lazaridis designed sets and costumes, was the first Aida produced by the English National Opera for forty years. Described by one critic as 'grand opera gone wild', it was a turning point for Lazaridis who stripped back the production for touring and went on to produce more minimalist designs when he worked with the visionary Russian director Yuri Lyubimov.

Lazaridis later returned to ENO and was appointed associate director in 1986. His numerous designs include his 1920s' Art Deco sets for Jonathan Miller's 1986 production of The Mikado (ENO 1986) and his sets and costues for the monumental Carmen directed by Seve Pimlott at Earl's Court arena in 1986.