Corpus Obscura designs physical products for clients who know what they want to exist, and do not yet know what a manufacturer needs in order to make it. The engagement begins with an idea and ends with something a shop can quote from, or with a prototype in hand, or wherever the client chooses to stop.
Who we work with
Clients typically arrive at the earliest stage, with whatever they have at hand: a description in words, a reference image, a rough sketch, or a competitor's product they want to improve on. The work of the engagement is to move from that to a specification a manufacturer can build.
Where we come in
Most clients arrive with the same set of problems. They do not have CAD capability in-house, and cannot produce a file a manufacturer will accept. A manufacturer they approached directly told them the design as stated is not buildable. They are competent in their business, but have not brought a physical product to market before. They have a prototype that works, but cannot be produced at price, or breaks in use, or does not look right.
The shared theme is a gap between what the client can describe and what a manufacturer can quote, and the practice exists to close it.
What we produce
Deliverables are shaped to the engagement.
A concept package contains renderings, form studies, material direction, and recommended next steps. A production-ready package contains CAD files, drawings with tolerances, a bill of materials, material and finish specifications, and assembly notes. Both are delivered to the client to use as they see fit.
Where the engagement calls for it, a physical prototype is produced through Manufacturing and handed over with the file package.
Scope
Design at Corpus Obscura is the work that makes a physical product possible to manufacture. The practice covers industrial and product design, functional engineering (load, stress, thermal, finite-element analysis), electrical and electronics design, and materials engineering. Specialists are engaged from a standing bench as the work requires.
How the engagement runs
Discovery. The first phase is informal. Conversation and concept sketches move together. There is no formal brief document; the artifacts the client reacts to are drawings and studies.
Refinement. Rounds of iteration are shaped to the engagement, agreed during onboarding, and governed by what the work actually needs rather than a published count.
Specification. The design is brought to a standard that permits accurate quotation by a manufacturer. Tolerances, materials, and assembly are resolved.
Handover. The deliverables are transferred. The engagement may continue into Manufacturing, or it may end here, at the client's direction.
The loop with Manufacturing
A physical product rarely moves straight from design to production. The first article often reveals something the drawings did not, a supplier may suggest a change that costs less, a material behaves differently in the hand than on paper. The work between design and production is a loop, not a pipeline.
Clients who engage Corpus Obscura for both Design and Manufacturing receive a single continuous engagement across both practices, with refinement feeding production and findings from production feeding back into the drawings. The client experiences it as one conversation, and the engagement moves between the two practices for as many cycles as the work requires.
Clients who engage Design only receive their deliverables and take them wherever they choose. The design is the client's.
Confidentiality
Non-disclosure is standard.