Christian Ghion has forged a unique, singular journey. Each experience breeding the next, he is also a very unique guy, who can be mistakenly off putting; built like a rugby man, with a playful bounce in his step, he leads with his chin, and greets everyone he meets with a magnificent smile and a broad infectious laugh. Ghion is malicious, playful, and instinctive, at once, brutish and elegant, rough and refined, understated and extremely persevering.

Christian was born, raised and educated on the outskirts of Paris. Perhaps this is the origin of his insatiable curiosity and thirst for discovery and experimentation of Christian’s constant questioning. In High School he was fascinated with photography and worked for his school newspaper, he then hesitated between graduate studies in Political Science, the IDHEC( institut des Hautes Etudes Cinématographiques), applying for the French Secret Service, finally choosing law.

After graduating from law school, Christian had various jobs, including working with an auctioneer, as a teacher’s aide for the Ministry of Justice, he enrolled in classes at the Ecole du Louvre, assisted film director François Reichenbach, and did the obligatory odd jobs of painting, masonry, woodwork, and other renovation tasks for friends and their friends.

Many traces of these early days remain firmly planted in Christian’s personal tastes, his membership in the Lancia car club, his passion for the Rolling Stones and Johnny Halliday, and his collection of cowboy boots, not as dreams of greatness or status symbols, but rather a reflection of his appetite for other worlds.

At the dawn of his current professional life, Christian was a classic jack-of-all trades, searching for his way, which he found at the Paris Architecture School at Conflans, enrolling in the ECM, furniture design section. This school lead to many important “rencontres”, with Yvonne Brunhamer of the Museum of Decorative Arts, Raymond Guidot of the Centre George Pompidou and Pierre Staudenmeyer of the NEOTU gallery. Upon graduating from the ECM department, Christian pursued his studies at the ENSCI (National School of Industrial Design), commonly referred to as “Les Ateliers”. And then at the age of 28, Ghion landed his design degree, and began a fruitful relationship with Architect Patrick Nadeau which lasted 10 years. In 1998, Christian made the bold decision to strike out on his own, setting up shop in the throbbing heart of Paris.

Upon launching his own studio, Christian’s career took off. Quickly Ghion established a reputable place for himself in the national and international design market. His eclectic style drew him in many different directions and garnered much attention and contracts from such prestigious companies as Cappellini, Cinna, Roset, Driade, Neotu, Octant, Poltrona Frau, Salviati, Sawaya & Moroni, and XO. In the fashion world, Christian designed a trophy for the “Venus de la Mode”, furniture for Thierry Mugler, perfume bottles for Dior, Lanvin and Yves Saint Laurent, and had shows at Colette and Comme des Garçons.

http://www.christianghion.com