Starr Restaurant Group approached Oat Foundry with a problem. They needed 18 totally custom sconces made for the newest addition to their restaurant portfolio: a whimsical French restaurant titled ‘Le Coucou’ in Soho, NY. “Custom” in common parlance means a few off-the-shelf-part mixed with some good old fashioned elbow grease. “Custom” for Stephen Starr is defined by individually cast and hand finished pewter tiaras, over 100’ of brazed pewter sheets, entirely unique hand blown glass shades, precisely laser cut steel backplates, and a trip to a UL agent for all the proper certifications.

Working with a design created by famous interiors firm Roman and Williams, Oat Foundry embarked on an exciting journey at breakneck speed to accomplish a Herculean task: build an entirely unique prototype sconce, subject it to the most critical eyes in the industry over two rounds of intense design review, and then hand build 18 more … in just 50 days.

Oat Foundry pulled out all the stops: creating high temperature silicone molds from SolidWorks-designed, 3D-printed parts; hand-casting each of the 18 beautiful tiaras; and welding and bending sheets and sheets of pewter. Then, after creating a 100-year patina on every piece of exposed metal, each of these sconces was individually UL Listed. Finally, the units themselves were hand-delivered to the new restaurant at 11 Howard Street in SoHo, complete with instruction manuals on how to assemble.