Tom Dixon was born in Sfax, Tunisia in 1959 and spent his early years in Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt. In the 1960s, he moved to England with his family, where he attended Holland Park comprehensive school, which is famous for its experimental education and excellent art department. There, Tom Dixon worked a lot with clay and developed a great interest in working with this versatile material.
After leaving school, Dixon initially attended the Chelsea School of Art in London, but soon dropped out. He played in a very successful band that gained local fame, and in the meantime, he was very fond of welding and design work.
His breakthrough as an industrial designer came in 1991 with the S-Chair for Cappellini. This was followed by many other successful furniture and lighting designs, which brought him international fame.
Tom Dixon has worked for Artek and Habitat, among others. At the latter, he first became Head of Design in 1998 and shortly afterwards Creative Director. Finally, in 2002, he founded his own design company under his own name, where he still works as a product designer today.