Ron Arad

He studied at the Jerusalem Academy of Art from 1971 to 1973, continuing his studies at the Architectural Association in London. In 1981 he founded a design firm under the name One Off and later the architecture and design firm Ron Arad Associates. For One Off he produced the Little Heavy Chair, considered a design icon, in 1989.

Arad's career as a designer began with the Rover chair, a leather seat from a Rover P6 mounted on a steel frame. His subsequent tireless experimentation with the possibilities of materials and technology, together with his radical reconception of the form and structure of objects large and small, placed him at the forefront of contemporary design and architecture.

He has designed various objects for Kartell, including the Bookworm bookcase (1997) and the FPE chair, and for Bonaldo, including RON-ALDODOWN winner of the 2003 iF Design Award. He was head of the design products department at the Royal College of Art in London from 1997 to 2009. In 2008 the design of the Bauhaus Museum in Tel Aviv.

In 2002 Ron Arad received the title of Royal Designer for Industry (RDI) in recognition of his "sustained excellence in aesthetic and efficient design for industry," and in 2011 he received the London Design Medal. He was Professor of Design at the Vienna Hochschule from 1994 to 1997 and later Professor of Product Design at the Royal College of Art in London until 2009, when he was appointed Professor Emeritus. In 2013 he was elected Royal Academician by the Royal Academy of Art in London.

He designed together with Bruno Asa the Design Museum Holon that opened in 2010 in Holon, Israel.

In 2014 he customized the Fiat 500, which was presented as the 500 Ron Arad Edition and went into limited series production from November of that year.

Ron Arad has won numerous international awards, was awarded an honorary degree from Tel Aviv University, and is regularly and widely published. His work is in dozens of prestigious public collections and has been widely exhibited in record exhibitions, including at MoMA (NYC), the V&A (London), and the Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris).

Ron Arad has designed for all major international furniture and design brands, including ZEUS, Vitra, Kartell, Moroso, Alessi, Driade, Cappellini, Cassina, WMF, Swarovski, Roca, and Magis. He has collaborated with a variety of fashion, technology and luxury brands, including Adidas, Nestle, Fiat, Samsung, LG, Bombay Sapphire, Hennessy, Ruinart, Kenzo and Le Coq Sportif, to name a few. His public artworks have adorned public spaces in London, Tokyo, Seoul, Milan, Toronto, Tel Aviv and Singapore.