Horse-Shaped Handle: Die-Cast Industrial Design for a USA Premium Market
A sculptural handle that still had to cast cleanly
Our client sells premium decorative hardware into the USA equestrian and lifestyle market. They wanted a horse-shaped handle distinctive enough to be a signature product, cast in zinc, with a finish quality that stands up to close inspection on a retail shelf.
The design needed to read clearly as a horse from multiple angles while staying within what die casting can actually produce: no undercuts a mould cannot release, no thin sections that would short-shot, and a finish that plates evenly across a complex sculptural surface.
What made this project hard
Sculptural form vs. mouldability
A recognizable horse silhouette that still releases cleanly from a die.
Consistent finish on a complex surface
Even plating across curves and fine detail, not just flat faces.
Premium feel at production cost
A shelf-ready feel without a one-off, hand-finished price point.
From sculpture to a tool that runs in production
Four stages, one team, no handoffs between them.
Industrial Design
Sculptural form developed and refined through iteration.
DFM for Die Casting
Geometry adjusted for mould release and fill.
Tool Design & Build
Production die engineered around the final form.
Production Batch
First run cast, finished, and inspected.
Industrial design that reads as a horse from every angle
Multiple sculptural directions were explored and refined against the target retail price point, balancing detail against what a die casting process can hold.
The final form keeps a recognizable horse silhouette while every undercut and thin section was resolved before it reached tooling.
Design for manufacture, before a single tool was cut
The sculptural surface was reworked in CAD so the mould could release cleanly, with draft angles and wall thickness tuned specifically for zinc die casting.
This stage is where most decorative die-cast parts fail if skipped, so it ran before any tooling investment was committed.
Tool design and build
A production die was engineered around the final approved geometry, built to run a full production volume without degrading part quality.
Tool trials validated fill, cooling, and part release before the die was signed off for production.
Production batch and finishing
The first production batch was cast, polished, and plated, with first-article inspection confirming the part matched the approved design.
Finish quality was checked specifically on the curved and detailed surfaces where plating is hardest to hold even.
What shipped
"Quick responsive 3D CAD work in Fusion and smooth revision handling. Explanation videos each time to explain the design choices made."
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