In around October of this previous year, my roommate noticed a cast iron skillet in the bottom of the river outside our apartment. We joked about taking it out and restoring it, but never had the motivation to do it. When starting this class and hearing about this project I thought it would make for the perfect upcycled material. Something that was beaten up to the point someone felt it belonged in the bottom of the river turned into something functional or decorative.
Just thinking of the material in general, exposed steel and raw cast iron is very common in the industrial aesthetic. Building off the industrial aesthetic, I wanted to use other materials that were prevalent in the industrial era. The first few items that came to mind are wood and brick. Brick would be very expensive and difficult to work with, but wood would be much easier to work with. My first idea was to make a cutting board inside the skillet. I would have to be careful to make the wood raised above the rim of the skillet, protecting the edge of a blade hitting the iron and chipping. I then thought a way to implement this would be to shape the wood to look like a liquid flowing over the sides of the skillet. Almost like a dough that rose too much and spilled over the sides. I could then play around with hanging it on the wall and have it look like the “liquid” is defying gravity. I could also repurpose it to be a charcuterie board instead of just a cutting board. I would not need to worry as much about protecting a knife, and it would make manufacturing a lot easier. Charcuterie boards often have handles, so the handle of the skillet would be perfect for this application.
Image from:
Engraved Solid Wood Charcuterie Board | Wood Cutting Board With Handle
Wood branding and the burning of logos into wood crates was used heavily in the era due to being a very quick and inexpensive to get your brand on shipping crates. I could use a laser printer to engrave a design on the wood to emulate some of the typography used in industrial aesthetics.
We have no idea how long the pan has been in the river, and it may be rusted to the point where it cannot be used as a pan again. In this case I would drill holes in the bottom of the pans and use screws to secure the wood to the skillet and use rubber tips to keep the screws from scratching a countertop or table. However, if I can recover the pan, I would like to maintain it as a pan and have the cutting board be separatable from the skillet. This would make the design very difficult but would be interesting to have multiple uses for the same piece of cookware.
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This is a really cool idea. It sounds like your idea is really going to fit the industrial aesthetic quite well! Do you have any experience with woodworking/making cutting boards? How do you plan to get the skillet out of the water?
This is such a cool idea! Having found the pan in the river makes for an interesting story to begin with and i think this is going to make for a really interesting piece. You mentioned using a laser cutter to engrave a design and typography, which I absolutely recommend you do as its an easy way to add design to wood and would look fantastic with the pan, fitting into your aesthetic.