MB&F and Caran d’Ache celebrate 15 years of the M.A.D.Gallery with the GorillaSharpener – a fully functional Caran d’Ache Sharpening Machine turned into a knuckle-walking mechanical creature, released on World Gorilla Day, September 24, in support of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund.
Since 1933, the Caran d’Ache Sharpening Machine has sat in Swiss classrooms, quietly turning wood and graphite into ideas. MB&F designer Maximilian Maertens lifts that familiar box onto gorilla-like limbs, tilting it forward as if ready to stride across the desk.
The piece began as 2D sketches of a gorilla’s stance, then moved to 3D, where moulding and construction constraints were solved so the posture could hold. Unlike the flat-footed original, this one appears to hover on stainless-steel and cast-iron legs while the mechanism remains every bit a sharpener.
Finished in Alpine Frost blue, it combines zinc alloy, steel and chrome-plated components. Each arrives with a special case, instruction booklet, a securing clamp for the desk, and a set of Caran d’Ache wooden pencils in packaging by MB&F collaborator Maxime Schertenleib.
Maertens admits the idea lingered for years. Gorillas fascinate – and after the 2024 DinoSharpener, Godzilla begged for a counterpart. Enter King Kong by way of Geneva.
This collaboration follows a familiar path between the two maisons, from the DinoSharpener back to 2016’s Astrograph. The intent is consistent: take a utilitarian object and let it reveal a more playful mind.
The charitable thread is explicit. MB&F partners with the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund through the symbolic adoption of Rwanda’s historic Pablo mountain gorilla group, first studied by Fossey’s team and still monitored today. Support goes to daily protection, equipment, research, transport and operations for a population just over 1,000.
On the desk – where ideas are born – the GorillaSharpener is a small ritual made strange and, therefore, noticed. A tool first, a sculpture second, and a reminder that function can carry quiet wonder.
Technical notes: limited to 300 pieces in Alpine Frost blue. Compatible with round or hexagonal pencils, 4-10 mm. Interchangeable cutter. Dimensions without limbs: 85 × 144 mm base; 135 mm height. With limbs: approx. 150 × 130 mm base; 150 mm height. Available exclusively via the MB&F eShop, M.A.D.Galleries, MB&F LABs and the MB&F Lounge in New York.
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