1959

Start
Born in Sfax, Tunisia, son of an English teacher and a journalist for the BBC World Service.

1972

Early Years
Tom attends Holland Park Comprehensive, which had a decent pottery department and Life Drawing class, which was where the initial obsession with materiality, manufacturing and form took shape.

1979

Art School and Odd Jobs
“If I had spent more time at art school, I would have been told to do this, or not to do that. There was great liberation in just being able to make different things using found objects, without having to justify myself.”

1981

Music Business
Two years as a professional musician, playing bass guitar in Funkapolitan, a disco band, taught Tom Dixon the fundamentals of creativity and commerce in the public eye.

1983

First 100 Chairs in One Year
“My first lesson in oxy-acetylene welding came from a friend with a car-body repair shop. A whole new world opened up to me – this was a quick and effective way for me to make things. I made over 100 chairs in my first year just because I could.”

1988

First Light
“This Spiral Light was probably my first real lamp and parked off an enduring passion and interest in lighting objects.”

1986

S-Chair
“My slightly more successful designs seem to be ones that can be read in different ways, quite opposite to their original intent. If my original departure point for the S-Chair was a chicken, it has often been described by others as a female form.”

1990

Pylon
“The making and remaking of the Pylon Chair countless times, to try and reinforce weak points and prevent collapse, taught me how to make things properly. It felt like a crash course in primitive structural engineering.”

1994

Jack
“It looked like a Japanese concrete sea defence or a model of a molecule with a fat and jolly personality. So it was named Jack – the Sitting, Lighting, Stacking Thing.”

1998

Habitat
Tom finally gets a proper day job – first as Head of Design, then as Creative Director at £500 million turnover retail legend Habitat.

2000

Royalty & Silverware
Tom receives the Order of the British Empire for services to Innovation and Design.

2002

Company Established
The Tom Dixon brand is founded in London and production starts on a line of extruded plastic products, Fresh Fat.

2003

Interior Design Expertise
The interior design division is established as Design Research Studio to deliver high concept interiors, architectural design and large scale installations under the creative direction of Tom Dixon.

2004

Mirror Ball
“Rather than vanishing into its environment as anticipated, Mirror Ball does the opposite, which is to be ultra-visible, showy, and as they say in France, bling-bling.”

2004

Artek
“Managing Artek for five years was a happy by-product of our collaboration with the Swedish company Proventus. Our tenure there as managers and part-owners culminated in a series of initiatives in sustainability, neutral materials and heritage.”

2005

Copper Shade
A result of Tom’s fascination with the high-tech process of vacuum metallization commonly used in sunglasses.

2005

Polystyrene Chair Grab
“Making a polystyrene chair has given me the opportunity to fulfil an ambition to make design available to all; this time literally, by giving away hundreds of these chairs to Londoners with absolutely no chains attached.”

2005

Rubber Band Chair
In a failed attempt to create the world’s longest seating, Tom Dixon built a 75m-long rubber band stretch system made from 12,000 super-size rubber bands in Trafalgar Square, London.

2006

Beat Lights
“I was involved in an initiative in Jaipur to create alternative possibilities for the rapidly vanishing craftsmen and their skills, and the Beat Light was born from that project.”

2007

Cracking the States
Our New York office and distribution centre opens, taking Tom Dixon to an American audience and kick starting our global ambition.

2008

Flame-Cut
“The idea with Flame-Cut furniture was to recreate ephemeral typologies of normally flat or fold-able items, such as poolside sun loungers, in the most heavyweight and indestructible material material possible.”

2010

Batch Zero
“We have set up an underwater BIOROCK production plant in the Bahamas, and have successfully grown some chairs and tables over the last three years.”

2013

adidas x Tom Dixon
“There’s no point in me trying to be a fashion designer. It’s not what these collaborations are about. What it is for me is sort of entering a new universe without any preconception.”

2014

Mondrian London
Our Studio takes on the design of hotel rooms, bar, lobby and restaurant at Sea Containers House in London.

2015

Melt
With Melt, our experiments in the technologically advanced field of vacuum metallisation takes on a new twist.

2015

Multiplex
The pop-up department store of the future, Selfridges London.

2015

Himitsu, Atlanta
First State-side hospitality project for Design Research Studio.

2016

American Adventure
In a landscape dominated by professional showrooms and multi-brand retailing chains, we have made the choice to evade the status quo.

2017

The Veterans
Initially manufactured in Tom’s London metalwork shop many moons ago – and subsequently under license for 20 years of Italian production – these instantly recognisable designs are finally brought back home.

2017

Super Texture
After years of shiny metallics we’ve finally gone a little bit soft. SUPER TEXTURE is our first foray into weaving, sewing and embellishing where we look at extreme textures of velvets, boucles and knits.

2017

Hong Kong Shop Opens
With an acceleration of interest for our work in this region, 52 Hollywood Road emerges as the new epicentre of our latest expansion in Asia.

2017

Le Drugstore
Our Studio’s latest project in the French capital.

2018

Hacking IKEA
Tom Dixon gets into bed with the biggest furniture company in the world to create a durable, transformable platform for living – DELAKTIG.