Kerf & Tine is a one room workshop in Marquette, Michigan, run by Ines Varga, who spent twelve years rehairing violin bows before she made her first comb. She cuts each blank from air dried pear wood, saws every tooth by hand with a fine gents saw, rounds the tips on three grades of paper, and soaks the finished comb overnight in camellia oil, so the teeth glide through wet or curly hair without snagging.
Who this theme is for
A small shop that sells hair and body tools made by hand: wooden combs, boar bristle brushes, horn shoehorns, pumice stones, oils. Buyers judge these by how the tips are finished, so the page opens on one comb lying on the bench, comes in close on the rounded teeth and the grain, then shows a tooth being sawn in the vise. The Warm Artisan layout uses rounded buttons and a soft serif, which suits a product people hold every morning.
What was decided in the brief
The style is Warm Artisan on its first variant. The primary is a copper orange close to the colour of oiled pear wood in low light, and the accent is an olive green taken from the leaves of the pear tree, so the buy button reads as warm without turning to red. The brand facts lead with the hand sawn teeth because that is what separates this comb from a moulded one, and the camellia oil comes last because it answers the question about snagging.