There are approximately 4,500 designs in the official Werkstätte Carl Auböck archive at the company's three-story workshop. The studio opened in 1912, making small, bronze figurines that were extremely popular collectibles in Austria during the 19th and early 20th centuries. By the mid-century, the company had pivoted to producing witty household items that landed somewhere between eccentric art deco and sharp Austrian modernism. The company is still in business, run by Carl Auböck IV, a fourth-generation metalsmith and trained architect.
Auböck's grandfather (Carl Auböck II) was responsible for the business's turn from practical to fanciful. He was a painter and student of the famed Bauhaus school and brought a clever, often humorous sensibility to the family business. Today, vintage Auböck pieces from the 1950s to 1970s are highly collectible, ranging in all sorts of prices. You can find a Vienna Secession-style table for $16,000 or a set of brass hangers for $900. Of that prolific 4,500-piece archive, one category of Auböck product has built an especially feverish following: the brand's kitchen goods.
A vintage Carl Auböck hand bottle stopper; Courtesy of Counter-Space.
Each item seems as delightful as the last. An Auböck bottle opener in the shape of a fish comes in several styles, ranging from leather-wrapped to a woven pattern or finished in a glossy rosewood. Another famous design is "the hand," which is applied to bottle openers and cork toppers alike. There are nutcrackers made from brass and leather and a pepper mill made of cow horns. Some items even feel even more specifically eccentric: a sugar-cube presenter that looks like a luxury paperclip or a cheese slicer that looks straight out of Alice in Wonderland. And of course, there is flatware.
Oh, the flatware.
Auböck's cult-loved flatware was first produced in the 1950s. They're wonky and artful. Edges became blunt and funky, simplified to their most simple silhouette, like something you might see in a Picasso painting. It comes with a price tag to match; a set of 24 pieces usually sells for around $2,000. There is currently an 81-piece set of blackened steel from 1979 listed on 1stDibs for $6,800. The design won the Diplôme d’Honneur at the Brussels World’s Fair and the Austrian National Design Prize in 1958, just a few years after it made its debut. Just last month, when former Bon Appetit editor and cookbook author Andy Baraghani curated a selection of goods for The Real Real, Auböck flatware made the cut. There aren't too many other styles of silverware that have reached such similar covetable status.
The famous flatware set model no. 2060, made of polished and brushed stainless steel; courtesy of 1stDibs.
The Auböck family has built a one-of-one catalog by making ordinary daily items feel extraordinary. Everyone has to crack open a bottle at some point. Why not do it with a metal fish or shiny tiny hand? I'd imagine that if a host gave me a sugar cube with a "sugar-cube presenter," I wouldn't soon forget that experience. And the best part is there is no end in sight. Carl Auböck IV's son (Carl Auböck V) just started to join his father in the workshop a few years back.
