The Ceramic Mushroom Salt & Pepper Shaker Set from the Japanese design company Puebco is a pair of ceramic shakers shaped like mushrooms, filled from the bottom through a silicone stopper. Mushrooms have been quietly colonizing kitchens and tabletops for a few years now, and these have the good sense to stay small and a little odd, the sort of thing a guest picks up mid-dinner to look at before remembering they only wanted salt.
WHY IT'S SPECIAL
Puebco has a talent for making ordinary household objects slightly peculiar without making them silly, and a salt and pepper set is about as ordinary, and as daily, as objects get. Refilling from the base keeps the caps clean and unbroken, so the mushroom shape stays a mushroom rather than a mushroom with a screw-top hat. It makes a good small gift for the cook, the forager, or the friend whose table already has opinions.
DETAILS
Set of salt and pepper shakers
Material: ceramic, silicone stopper
Dimensions: 6.5 x 6.2 x 8 cm / 2.6 x 2.4 x 3.1 in
Silicone stopper heat resistant to 180°C / 356°F
Not dishwasher or dish-dryer safe
HOW TO USE
Remove the silicone stopper on the underside and fill with fine salt and ground pepper, then press the stopper back in. Coarse salt or anything with a lot of moisture may clog the holes. Wash by hand.
THE BRAND
Puebco was founded in Japan in 2007 around the idea of making things instinctively, often from found and recycled materials and through handmade processes. The company believes the objects we live with should carry a sense of history and weight, the way people carry their own experiences, and it treats small irregularities as details meant by design rather than flaws.
