We wanted to change the way people interact with ceramic container storage—from keeping it tucked away, to placing it proudly on the countertop. Our goal was to design modern storage containers that are highly functional, beautiful to look at, and reusable to help eliminate the need for excess paper and plastic packaging.

The Irvington Collection was designed to be handled with ease. The mouths of the containers are unique because they are threaded to fit with a choice of brass or rubber screw top lids, a quality not commonly seen in ceramics. The screw tops help seal in freshness and the opening is large enough for even the biggest hands to fit through, making contents easy to access for anyone. Similar to the spines of books, the Irvington Containers nestle together perfectly on the counter, but are even easier to grab due to their tapered design, finger hole, and slightly textured surface.

Design Team

Kept Goods is designed, owned and operated by Brett Binford, Chris Lyon, Ben Coughlin and Craig Ritchie. Public Relations inquiries are handled by Nicole Curcio.

Ideation and Production

The design process began with conversations and sketches, before moving to digital renderings, and 3D printed prototypes. It was important to us to blend new technology with time honored, hand crafted techniques in the creation of the Irvington Containers.

Each container is produced by hand in Portland, OR at Mudshark Studios, using a process called slip casting. A mother mold is made from latex, which is then used to create plaster molds for each of the four sizes. Liquid clay, or slip, is poured into the molds and allowed to set for a specified amount of time. The longer it sets, the thicker the walls of the finished container will be, so there is a bit of science behind calculating the setup times.

Once the excess liquid is poured from the molds and the clay has dried to a leather hard state, the molds can be opened and the containers are moved to the potter's wheel. Ceramic artists then clean the seams, hand-trim the mouths and stamp the Kept Goods logo on the bottom. The containers are finally bisque fired, glazed and fired again to create the finished product.

Selection

The Irvington Collection is Kept Goods' first product offering and is available in 4 sizes: 24 ounce, 32 ounce, 48 ounce and 64 ounce. Shoppers can choose from matte black, celadon or matte white, and can use the brass lid they come with, or select black or white rubber lids.

The containers have a variety of uses in the kitchen: bulk foods, cookies, dog treats, coffee, tea, cereal and more. They can also be used to store bath items, like cotton balls; gardening items, like seeds or fertilizers, or for general household organizing.

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