There are very few people in this world who have the creative capacity to bring the true magic of Christmas to life.
Christopher Radko of Yonkers has always drawn inspiration from the whimsical, playful, and fanciful nature of Christmas. Over the past 38 years, he has brought true joy to the masses with his level of artistry and imagination.
“If you can still see the tree, you’re not done yet.”
This mantra has certainly been taken quite seriously as his creations would put any Who in Whoville to shame.
Christopher skipped his senior year of high school at Sacred Heart, and by 16, entered college. He eventually graduated from Columbia University in 1981. And as he comes from two parents in the medical field, his life seemed to have a predestined path. However, Christopher had a different plan in mind.
A career in Christmas
His ornament-crafting odyssey actually began way back in 1984. But before that, he was a humble mailroom clerk at ICM Partners. As the story goes, In December of that year, his family’s 14-foot Christmas tree, adorned with 2,000 family heirloom ornaments crashed, destroying them all due to an old, rusty, Christmas tree stand. He then set himself on a mission to replace the ones lost. In 1985, after scouring through different collections, vendors, and stores he could find, he soon realized that none of them met his well-founded creative standards, thus leading him to resort to making them from scratch instead. He simply wasn’t going to settle for the cheaper, plastic, mass-produced varieties; he had to have the real deal.
He enlisted the help of a well-known Polish Glassblower after traveling to Poland, his homeland, and began his ornament-making journey, bringing his imagination to life. After bringing the glassblower back to the United States, he was originally going door to door to Manhattan retailers, providing samples in hopes of supplementing his mailroom clerk income.
He launched that same year in 1985, with 60 hand-crafted ornaments, and as they say, the rest was history. By 1997, sales by his company totaled $50 million. And by 2005, he sold his company to Rauch Industries.
A commitment to craftmanship
Mr. Radko’s pieces are exquisitely and meticulously hand-crafted, gaining inspiration from the vintage 1950s-1960s ornament designs. He also uses an array of design methods to create his one-of-a-kind pieces such as Renaissance-era carving, silver lining, foil, hand painting, and molding.
You can identify an authentic, genuine Radko original by its custom, gold Radko crown charm.
His ornaments have gained such international, critical acclaim, that they have embellished The White House and the Kennedy Center. They are even a part of personal collections of some of the world’s most famous figures such as Elton John, Oprah Winfrey, John Travolta, Robert DeNiro, Elizabeth Taylor, and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Let us hope we can be graced with many more decades of Christopher Radko
creations as they are a true treasure; adding to the essence of Christmas Magic.
