Tom Dixon (industrial designer)

On Design: Tom Dixon on the significance of the blow torch from Nowness by Daniel Stier

Tom Dixon, OBE (born 21 May 1959, Sfax, Tunisia) is a self-taught British designer. He is currently the Creative Director of the brand 'Tom Dixon' specialising in Lighting, Furniture and Accessories.

His works have been acquired by museums across the globe, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, Museum of Modern Art New York and Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.

Career

Tom rose to prominence in the mid 1980s as “the talented untrained designer with a line in welded salvage furniture". He set up ‘Space’ as a creative think-tank and shop front for himself and other young designers. By the late 1980s, he was working for the Italian giant Cappellini for whom he designed the Iconic ‘S’ chair.^[1]

In the 1990s, he became a household name with ‘Jack’, his polythylene "sitting, stacking, lighting thing" designed for his own company ‘Eurolounge’.^[2] In 1993 he participated in the ″greatest exhibition of British furniture design of the 20th century″, organized by Helmut Diez in Bremerhaven, Germany.^[3] In 1998 Tom was appointed head of design by Habitat and later became Creative Director until 2008. He was the public face of a collective team responsible for rejuvenating the Habitat brand.^[2]

In 2002 Dixon established his own brand under the name ‘Tom Dixon’. The company is based in Portobello, London. In 2004 Proventus, the Swedish-based private investment company, teamed up with Tom Dixon to establish Design Research, a design and product development holding company.^[4] The Tom Dixon brand launches new collections of lighting and furniture bi-annually at the Milan international furniture fair and at London Design Festival. In 2012 the company launched its first accessories range at Maison et Objet, Paris. The company’s products are sold internationally in 65 countries.

In 2007 Dixon launched Design Research Studio, an interior and architectural design studio. High-profile projects include Restaurant at The Royal Academy in London ,^[5] Jamie Oliver’s London restaurant, Barbecoa^[6] as well as Shoreditch House.^[7] Most recently Design Research Studio announced their first ever hotel project, redesigning the iconic Thames-side Sea Containers House in collaboration with US hotel giant Morgans Hotel Group due for completion summer 2014.^[8]

Awards

Dixon holds Honorary Doctorates from Birmingham City University (2004) ^[9] and University of the Arts London (2007).^[10] He was appointed an OBE for services to British Design in 2001.^[9]

Publications

• The Interior World of Tom Dixon (2008) Octopus Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-84091-519-8, ISBN 978-1-84091-519-8
• Dixonary (2013) Violette Editions. ISBN 978-1-900828-42-0

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tom Dixon.

• Tom Dixon corporate website