In a world saturated with screens, Oat Foundry uses analog technology to cut through digital noise. Our kinetic installations provide physical presence, tactile movement, and intentional messaging that bring curiosity, sound, and sustainable design into spaces. Learn more about our analog story, team, and family of products below.
Over a decade ago, we rented a garage in Bensalem and fished for custom engineering and design jobs around the Northeast. We built everything from pretzel vending machines to furniture, ice cream packaging machines to a high-capacity coffee brewer. Fast forward a few years we landed a project with a client who needed a fun new way to display menu items in their restaurant – in this case, old means new. We built our first Split Flap, and it just clicked for us. Some might even say it was our eureka moment. From there, we divided our time between building and further engineering our take on Split Flaps while simultaneously taking on a handful of engineering projects. In 2021, we decided we’re all in on analog technology, focusing our energy on all things analog.
Our analog team includes old souls, artists, and engineering wizards who meet at the intersection of utility, responsiveness, and good design. In addition to creating analog installations for industries all over the world, our team is constantly innovating on how to transform spaces into environments that feel human, memorable, and refreshingly screen-free.
Our analog technology goes beyond just cool branding or modern design. Our installations use a fraction of the power and energy compared to digital alternatives. We’re happy to share how low our power consumption is – click the button below to see our power usage stats and product comparisons.
We’re a small team in Philadelphia and have hundreds of displays in 25 countries around the world. That’s made possible by building a product that is robust, easy to maintain, and well supported. Every Split Flap and Picture Flap includes our Five-Year Limited Warranty, along with ongoing access to our support team— real humans based here in Philadelphia who know these displays inside and out.
From its humble beginnings to its international presence, Split Flap has been at the core of our business since we launched our first few boards in 2016. What comes off as such a simple idea is truly a very complex piece of machinery with tens of thousands of parts in every board. Eight years later and with hundreds of international signs (including our largest to date, located in Cambridge), it’s still the heart of Oat Foundry. We’re still finding innovative ways every day to use it. We love to start sentences with: “It’d be cool if Split Flap could…”
By 2019, our Split Flap client base had grown, and in turn, so had our capabilities. With this expansion and innovation, we brainstormed more ways to use Split Flap than just as an alphanumeric display. “Let’s put photos on a Split Flap” – this is one of the ideas that led to the build. Soon after we got the idea, we partnered with Shinola to build the first-ever Picture Flap for their winter product line. Today, Picture Flap is used to honor legacy in schools and stadiums, bring movement and energy into retail flagship stores, and much more.
The idea for Chroma Flap, inspired by the same mechanical motion as Split Flap, was born from a desire to see vibrant color in the same stunning, three-dimensional framework as our signature analog technologies. The evolution of Chroma Flap from concept to creation was truly a multi-disciplinary, cross-departmental collaboration, with every member of the team contributing their unique skill sets to inspire a truly innovative analog installation.
Our family of analog products wouldn’t shine as brightly without Algorithm, the companion technology to all of our installations. Algorithm allows visitors to interact with installations directly through pre-determined dials. Without compromising the integrity of the display, Algorithms are the key to driving on-brand interaction in offices, exhibitions, universities, retail concepts, and much more.
You might have noticed – we’re passionate about creating physical products that make a lasting impression. Each year, we release a new edition of our lookbook, featuring our latest installations and the newest developments in our analog technology. Request a copy below and we’ll send one your way by snail mail.
Click the button below to send a message to our team.
We look forward to hearing from you!