Franck Benito:
perpetuating a family passion for crystal

Franck Benito: perpetuating a family passion for crystal

Every intricate crystal object made by Franck Benito is infused with the passion of a whole family, handed down over three generations.

His grandfather, José, began the family’s story. Arriving in France from his native Spain in 1925, he found work in Paris making glass perfume bottle stoppers, which were much in demand at the time. However, increased mechanisation after World War Two pushed him to look for a new craft. It was his son Martin, apprenticed to a crystal cutting workshop in his teens, who taught José to cut crystal – a skill that would secure the family’s future.

In 1952, the family business was launched. Maison Cristal Frères, as it was first called, went from strength to strength as Martin perfected the grinding techniques necessary to sculpt glass, developed the characteristic Cristal Benito 32-point star, and created highly sought-after pieces.

Franck Benito at work Élodie Daguin©Michelangelo Foundation

“My father had such a technical skill level that it took me almost 15 years to achieve it,’ says Franck Benito, Martin’s son, who joined the family business at the age of 19. Growing up, Franck was more interested in football than the noisy workshop, but after failing his studies, he suggested to his father that he try and help develop the commercial side of the business. Over the years, he learned the craft, too, picking up 80 percent of what he knows now from his father in the same workshop he still occupies today. “Commercially it interested me right away,” he says, “and artistically over the years of gaining the necessary skill it became a passion.” 

With his youth and his business sense, Franck was well placed to ensure the company evolved with the times. He expanded the product range, developing a line of lighting in a contemporary style, and taking on more artistic, bespoke commissions. He also turned to restoration, working with companies including Baccarat, Daum and Lalique. “It’s artistically inspiring because we have in our hands works that were made 200 to 300 years ago,” he says. “But by far the aspect of my work that I am most passionate about is the creation, where the only constraint is to make something that is beautiful.”

To do so, he experiments and works by trial-and-error as though in a scientific laboratory. He also collaborates with other artisans, which allows him to discover new techniques and add different elements to his work, resulting in exquisite pieces like his Elephant Bar, a minibar with a base cast in gold-plated bronze and a crystal glass top set with emeralds.

It’s this constant experimentation that Benito credits with enabling the company to survive for 70 years and counting. “Today, the reason that we still exist in this domain is because we are able to create unique pieces that others cannot,” he says.

But will Cristal Benito (as it was renamed in 2005, after Franck took the reins following Martin’s death) stay in the family for generations to come? As a Maître d’art, he recognises the importance of passing on his skills to an apprentice, just as his father did to him, but he won’t pressure his two daughters to follow him into the business. “I believe in letting them find their own path,” he says. “It has to come from them. You cannot impose these crafts; it has to come from the heart.”

In the end, as three generations of the Benito family have shown, the most important thing behind craft is passion.

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