What Patrick Roger is known for
Patrick Roger, based in Sceaux since 1997 and named Meilleur Ouvrier de France in 1999 for his 62-kilo chocolate sculpture Harold, treats chocolate as sculptural material — casting works in bronze, glass and iron alongside his edible pieces.
Patrick Roger started his training at 15 as an apprentice baker-pastry chef in Châteaudun, moved to Paris at 18 to work under pastry chef-chocolatier Pierre Mauduit, and set up his own base in Sceaux in 1997. Two years later he won Meilleur Ouvrier de France, the demanding national craftsman title, on the strength of a sculpture called Harold — a life-size, 62-kilogram chocolate figure of a South American cocoa planter, crouched at work and balanced improbably on the tips of its feet.
That piece set the direction for everything after it: Roger treats chocolate the way a sculptor treats marble, working from large blocks in his workshop, and has gone further than most chocolatiers by casting the same forms in bronze, aluminum, glass and iron, moving between edible chocolate work and gallery-facing art. Press coverage has nicknamed him “the Rodin of chocolate” for the scale and ambition of the pieces. He was named a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in 2018, recognition rare for someone working primarily in a food trade. For a visitor, a Patrick Roger shop functions partly as a small gallery — sculptural showpieces displayed alongside the bars, palés and confections that make up the sellable range.
How ORBIS reads this city
Best for — His 62-kilo chocolate sculpture Harold
Handcrafted in his Parisian atelier with single-origin cocoas.
More in Paris
- Balenciaga — Paris
- Bourrienne Paris X — Paris
- Cartier — Paris
- Céline — Paris
- Chanel — Paris
- Charvet — Paris
- Creed — Paris
- Dior — Paris
Where next
- Jean-Paul Hévin — Paris
- Pierre Hermé — Paris
- Cron & Lanz — Göttingen
Hand-curated for ORBIS · no paid placement