Designers Christopher STEAD

DESIGN PRACTITIONER, FORMER ARCHITECT (GB&FR)

Born 1958 in Kilmacolm, Scotland, Christopher STEAD is a trilingual Paris-based designer and former architect (FR/UK) with over 40 years of experience in a broad international context (Africa, Asia, Europe, North America).

Design as “the riddle of a solution” remains his criterion of predilection.

His professional career started in 1979 in the Milan offices of Aldo ROSSI & Gianni BRAGHIERI, leading him to be invited to teach in various schools of architecture and interior design in several countries (UK, France, Switzerland).

He settled in Paris in 1986 & started his architectural practice in 1989, amongst those to early benefit from the very first EC Directive on the mutual recognition of diplomas — a short-lived, pre-Brexit vantage.

He has served in public office (2003-2006) as architect member elected to the Architects Registration Board for the United Kingdom, and represented it in Brussels as delegate to the Architects Council of Europe.

Since 2016 his ‘more-than-meets-the-eye’ focus is on the design & procurement of tailored furnishings, usually at the behest of private individuals, often for specific spaces.

Such contexts lead the bespoke designer off the beaten track, where the architect's uomo universale ideal tends necessarily to come to the fore : the obligation and indeed aptitude to deal with genuine challenges, spurning reliance on pre-programmed or third-party prescribed solutions — hence his militant rejection of obligatory CPD aka “Continuous Professional Decline.”

In FUORISALONE 2024 he presents two brands, one for singular pieces and small runs authenticated by his Paris design studio, another (La Chaise Gigogne) destined to group collections of nesting chairs.