OVERVIEW
The Field Company skillet was born out of a desire of two brothers to create cookware with the craftsmanship of vintage skillets and to make them here in the USA. We liked the challenge of how to try and improve on something so simple and we believed in the company’s vision, so we invested in the project and got on board for the ride.
Field Company
WHAT WE DID
Industrial Design, Manufacturing Liaison
DESIGN TEAM
Stuart Harvey Lee, Jochen Schaepers, James Kwon, Juan Jimenez, Troy Yoshimoto
BRIEF
Bring Vintage Back
Quite simply the question that the Muscarella brothers had was “Why don’t they make them like they used to?"
Field Company came to Prime Studio for our help in solving that question and our guidance in how to go about creating a product and a brand from scratch. In addition to our skills as designers, they recognized that we bring a huge amount of experience in launching products in a variety of categories and they knew they’d need some ‘hand-holding’ along the way.
Once they found out we were avid cooks and that our founder, Stuart, started his career as an mechanical engineer in a UK steelworks there was no turning back.
PROCESS
Getting the Ingredients Right
The first thing on our agenda was to visit the Foundry and Machinists to talk shop. We wanted to make sure that whatever we designed could be manufactured consistently and efficiently. The clients had spent over a year researching vintage skillets, metallurgy, seasoning techniques etc., so we also got a deep knowledge dump from them. And of course, we did lots of cooking in vintage cast iron. Research can be a lot of fun sometimes.
We walked into Prime having never made a physical product—but having extremely strong opinions on what we were trying to create with the Field Skillet. Prime helped us refine our ideas, guided us, pushed back and really functioned like an extension of our team. They also had incredible patience and equally high standards—we couldn't have been luckier to have worked with them.
CHRIS MUSCARELLA
FOUNDER, FIELD COMPANY
Video by The Culinary Fanatic
The actual design process was pretty straightforward. Sketches and renders led to handcarved foam models before we turned to CAD to check weight, proportions and run 3D printed prototypes. From an aesthetic perspective we wanted to be respectful to the traditions of cast iron but to modernize (for example with longer handles) where appropriate.
We found out that the Foundry could make us one-off cast parts relatively quickly so we produced and tested a number of designs and revisions, since the best way to really evaluate a pan is to cook with it. This iterative process and attention to detail is what gives the Field Company skillet its combination of great handling and outstanding cooking performance. These pans are designed to be around for multiple lifetimes so we wanted to make sure the design was perfect.
After casting the pans are hand-finished to remove any burrs from the casting process and then transferred to our machine shop. There we CNC the cooking surface to provide a smooth, non-stick finish and also remove excess weight to make the pans suitable for everyday use by everybody.
Finally the pans go through a multi-stage seasoning process so they are to cook right out of the box.
THE RESULT
A Modern Heirloom
The Field Company skillet mixes classic details and a contemporary form. There is nothing superfluous about it, yet it has a distinct personality. We’re proud of the fact that it uses American manufacturing knowledge and is bringing jobs to a depressed area of the Mid-West.
Those sentiments also resonated with consumers. The Kickstarter campaign that Field Company launched to fund production tooling met its goal on day one, eventually raising $1.6M instead of it’s $30K target.
We have continued to work with Field Company since the launch of their original #8 skillet to develop an entire line of cast iron cookware all of which is made right here in the USA and every piece was designed with love by Prime Studio. Their line now comprises their iconic skillet in sizes from a #4 to a #12 (Cast iron sizing is an legacy system which we had to learn to make sure our designs were authentic - for anyone who is interested the best reference we have found is that provided by David G. Smith, The Panman).
We also developed Dutch ovens and lids (sized to fit the skillets too for versatility) and flat griddles all of which have Field Company’s signature machined smooth non-stick surface and everyday light weight.
Perhaps some of the most fun from a design perspective has been designing speciality pieces and accessories such as the #16 double-handled skillet which was developed for live fire cooking and a line of made in Vermont cherry wood spoons where got to collaborate with master spoon carver Emmet van Driesche.
There are more pieces in the works so stay tuned for updates.
Watch the Kickstarter launch:
