Nothing says “borderline drinking problem” like owning a hip flask. We guess you have to weigh the judgment of strangers against the almost magical ability to make liquor appear from your back pocket.
Maybe the problem lies in presentation. Julianne Ahn, founder of Brooklyn ceramics studio Object and Totem softened the blow by designing a series of ceramic bracelets that each hold about one shot’s worth of liquor (meaning you’ll probably need a couple of them to get a good buzz going). She was inspired by a flask she saw at a museum of objects that were collected from Amish people, an agrarian culture that lives in states such as Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania. The flask got Ahn wondering if she could do her own take on the design. She produced bracelets that could be worn proudly by any hard boiled detective with an eye for fashion.
The simplicity of Ahn’s flask belies the process to create the pieces, which sounds quite difficult. She describes the work for Dezeen:
Produced by Williamsburg-based studio Areaware, the hand-thrown vessel starts out as a single ball of clay. It is then gradually worked and opened up in the middle until it looks like a “flat doughnut”.
“After steadily applying pressure to the middle of the body, you join both walls together,” explained Ahn. “You are basically trapping air as you put pressure on the top to seal the form.”
“When I set out to make my own version of the circle flask I learned that it is a simple process that requires a lot of patience,” she added.
“In the beginning, I got so carried away on the first few attempts trying to refine the outside that I ended up with a few deflated donuts.”
According to her web site, Object & Totem is a small handmade ceramics and jewelry studio produced by Julianne Ahn, a graduate from The Rhode Island School of Design and The School of the Art Institute of Chicago with a background in Textiles and Fiber & Materials Studies. Inspired by the nuances of meditative processes such as cording and turning, each product is created by hand with a focus on maintaining its novelty, craft and memory whether functional or an intimate piece of decor. Formerly based in Philadelphia and Berlin, the studio is currently located in Brooklyn, NY and continues to evolve, with a current emphasis on classic tableware, limited edition vessels, hand thrown beaded jewelry and experimental art objects.
Bill Rodgers is a Contributing Editor at CFile.
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