I have a peripheral interest in design and aesthetics. Who doesn’t like functional devices that look nice?
My sister gave me a membership to the Museum of Modern Art when I first moved to New York in the 70’s. Later, when I worked at ABC, I had the benefit of their corporate membership for admission. I used to walk to MOMA on 54th Street just to wonder at the things in the Architecture and Design Collection on the third floor.
The collection has a cast aluminum ice cream scoop that was designed by Sherman L. Kelly (American, 1869-1952) in 1935. The manufacturer, Zeroll, describes Kelly’s thinking:
“… As the story goes, Kelly was vacationing in West Palm Beach, Florida, when he observed a young woman dipping ice cream. Noticing the blisters on her hand from the constant use of the disher in the hard ice cream, he thought to himself, “there must be a better way to serve ice cream.” Kelly resolved to find it. In 1933, Sherman Kelly developed the design for the Zeroll® Ice Cream Dipper and received a patent. The dipper was a non-mechanical ice cream scoop, made of cast aluminum, with fluid inside the handle. Its unique design transferred heat from the user’s hand, warming the fluid, which in turn defrosted the ice cream dipper…”
I’ve wanted one of these since I saw it at MOMA. After the head broke off our last scoop, I bought a slightly updated version of the Zeroll Ice Cream Scoop for $19
