First he thought about studying chemical engineering. Then architecture. But a friend suggested industrial design. So Cristián Mohaded (1980) decided to pursue this career, which he came to by chance (as he himself insists).
“I met professors who showed me other ways of designing, much more conceptual, research-oriented, and I understood that I could do more than design a car or a machine. And that’s when I started to develop my own story,” confesses the designer, whose catalog includes furniture and lamps designed for Roche Bobois, among others, as well as rugs, interior design projects, and exhibitions.
Some of his works are part of the permanent collections of institutions such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. He has also received awards (Konex Diploma Award for Merit 2022, Visual Arts) and collaborate with brands such as Loro Piana and more recently Louis Vuitton (in 2025).
When a company calls you, it is because there is something about your work, your creative form, that interests them. I also know that you have to be part of that company, so I like to study it, I try to do interviews with the people who have more history within the company. From there I start connecting cables in my head. Somehow I connect my world with theirs. It’s a particular way of working: they hire me to provide a service that is tied to my way of thinking and tied to the aesthetics of a brand.
When I work on personal projects, I have more freedom, it’s a more fluid process, with fewer boundaries.
Some projects take a year or two. Others, 5 days. It doesn’t matter if it’s for a brand or not. For example, I’m working with a brand that asked me to do a project a month ago, and I have to deliver it in a month, and it’s a huge project! When I have more time it is much better, but under pressure you have to know how to work.
Design doesn’t start from scratch, it has to do with what surrounds us, and information from everywhere, from reading a book, going to the theater, traveling, or walking around the city. I am very observant, very detail-oriented. I have an obsession with knowing how things are made.
I don’t have any of my work at home. I tend to buy very no name-brand: a black chair, a black table, some gray chairs. I feel more comfortable that way. It’s not that I say, “I don’t want anything by another designer”.
In my house, for example, I have a painting that my goddaughter did when she was 5 years old. I have an object or a stone that I brought back from a trip or a piece of pottery. I am much more tied to the memories than to the object.
On the other hand, in my studio I have most of my things, I show them, it’s my work.
Text by RAQUEL SEIJAS. Photos: Courtesy CRISTIAN MOHADED / Courtesy LOUIS VUITTON
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