Refractory’s Angie West Throws a Feast Inspired by the American West

"This gathering is a stripped-down, Western-style feast," says Angie West, cofounder of Chicago fabrication studio, metal foundry, and glassworks atelier West Supply. Earlier this year, West painted her 1909 colonial revival/Tudor-style home, in Oak Park’s Frank Lloyd Wright Historic District, a charcoal brown. The choice grew out of her current preoccupation with the rugged geological forms, colors, and wildlife of the American West.

It also informed the recent collection of cast-bronze objects she and business partner Alberto Vélez developed to launch their new design brand, Refractory. "Craftsmanship in objects and artifacts is so closely bound to necessity," West says, "and the material the nature provides." The object’s she’s chosen to include on her table reflect the energy of the brand’s first collection.