A local artist has been tapped by KitchenAid to do custom art-work on their iconic stand mixers. Dean Loucks, an artist we profiled a couple of months ago, is teaming up with the Benton Harbor based KitchenAid to custom paint the stand-mixers.
KitchenAid says they are a pioneer when it comes to color in the kitchen and this takes that to the next level. They are starting with six limited edition Loucks designs. He will hand paint each one at his shop in Elkhart.
KitchenAid says they got a lot of pictures from artists but his work stood out.
"We've been discussing customizing kitchen-aid appliances for many years, and a friend of a team member brought a painted toaster to our attention," said Beth Robinson with KitchenAid. "And we loved the artwork so much and we also found out he's a local artist, and we love to support the community, so we called him up and started to talk to him about the idea of painting our small appliances, in particular, the stand-mixers."
Loucks has been hard at work since Thanksgiving getting ready for this big launch, and he's started painting 100 of them. He's already added four people to his staff, and says it could mean adding 100 before this is over.
Loucks says he needs help taking the mixers apart, sand them for painting, clear-coating them, and putting them back together, among other tasks. Loucks says he can't even guess how many hours go into each one just yet, but he's clearly incredibly excited about the new venture.
"Oh, it's over the top. This is way fun. They got the right mind set. Everything, everyone's pulling behind it. I've never seen a company work with anybody this large, that is just right on board with everything that needs to happen. It's pretty incredible," said Loucks.
All that work doesn't come cheap. The mixers retail at $1,899. KitchenAid says there's definitely a market for this practical piece of artwork.
