soy shapes

These dishes make playing with your food look classy and intelligent.

There’s always something cool and unusual to be found on Kickstarter, like ramen charts, samurai armor hoodies, or, in this case, ceramic saucers that play tricks with your eyes when filled with soy sauce.

▼ Soy Shape models “Cubes” and “Impossible Triangle”

soy shapes dishes

As for exactly how this optical illusion works, creator and designer Duncan Shotton says that the slightly varying levels of the inner surface of the saucers take advantage of natural color gradations that occur in soy sauce at different depths. Thus, when the saucers are filled, the soy sauce takes on a 3-D quality, as the Tokyo-based Shotton himself explains in this introductory video.

The dishes are made from Hakuji porcelain in Gifu. Hakuji ceramics have a legacy stretching back to the 1600s, so the Soy Shape saucers are definitely going to be high-class.

soy shapes boxes

You already know the drill when it comes to Kickstarter: the more you pledge, the more awesome the perks become.  Although the campaign has already raised nearly four times the amount of its initial goal, you can still get in on the action and score a Soy Shape at prices starting at 15 pounds (US$19.50).

Duncan’s other successful Kickstarter items, like the hugely popular rainbow pencils and sticky page markers, are available for sale on his website, as well.

▼ Naturally, we’re partial to the Tokyo edition of the sticky page markers!

Tokyo Sticky Page Markers

There’s only a few days left in the Soy Shape campaign, so head on over to the Kickstarter page ASAP if you’re looking to pick one up.

Source: Japaaan, Duncan Shotton Design Studio
Images: Duncan Shotton Design Studio