PANArt is the Swiss workshop of Felix Rohner and Sabina Schärer that invented the Hang in 2000 and now hand-makes a family of successor sound sculptures in Bern.

PANArt closes the round with the ultimate new maker — one that did not just rethink an instrument, but invented one. From Bern, Switzerland, the workshop of Felix Rohner and Sabina Schärer created the Hang in 2000: a hand-hammered steel instrument played with the hands, developed from the Trinidadian steelpan and other influences. Its answer to how a house becomes a name is invention: make something that did not exist before. A Swiss workshop that gave the world a new instrument.

Its identity is the inventors of the Hang. PANArt’s invention of the Hang, its hand-made Swiss craft and its family of successor instruments are the work it is known for. An instrument, invented. A workshop that started an entire instrument family.

(Honest notes, so the story stays precise. PANArt — PANArt Hangbau AG — is a Swiss company in Bern, founded and long led by Felix Rohner and Sabina Schärer, who invented the Hang in 2000; we present them as its inventors and long-time leaders without asserting the exact 2026 management. On what it makes now — an important, honest point — PANArt halted its original multi-generation Hang production run around 2013 and shifted its focus to a family of successor instruments (the Gubal and the Pang/Hang-family pieces); its own current site still presents a Hang alongside these, so we do not flatly claim the Hang is discontinued, and we describe the maker as having evolved into this successor family. On where it is made, its instruments are hand-made in Switzerland. On the crucial naming point: “Hang” is PANArt’s own trademark, and PANArt made the original; the generic term the wider world uses, “handpan,” was coined later by other makers for the instrument class that followed — so many handpans exist, but PANArt made the first, and we never imply other makers’ handpans are PANArt’s. Its Trinidadian steelpan roots are referenced as a respectful influence, with no cultural motif reproduced. Its name, marks and the Hang’s distinctive shape are IP, described but never reproduced, and there is no official brand hex; these tones are an unofficial interpretation. This is design commentary and does not promote any product.)

PANArt lives in a nitrided-steel palette. Click a swatch to copy the hex.

PANArt’s identity is inventive, Swiss and hand-made — a nitrided steel, an ink, a patina, a deep steel, and a paper. The palette leans nitrided steel and patina: the register of hammered, heat-treated steel and a quiet workshop. It signals invention and craft. The honest caveat: with no published brand hex, these values are an original, unofficial interpretation, not first-party colours.

The lesson is a nitrided-steel palette signals an inventive, hand-made identity. PANArt’s world is an inventive, steel, Swiss object. For designers, it is a reminder that a cool steel and a soft patina can carry a house built on inventing an instrument — the blue-grey of nitrided steel and the sheen of a hammered surface. Because these tones can fail as small text, keep type dark and let the colour live in the accents, palette and band. The takeaways: invent rather than iterate; hand-make it; be honest about the trademark and the generic name; and treat any single hex as unofficial.

The register is a sculpture serif — refined, quiet, inventive.

PANArt’s identity carries a refined, quiet, inventive spirit — a sound-sculpture workshop, not a fashion label. A sculpture serif captures the mood: elegant, still and considered, the register of an instrument that is half sculpture. Set in a nitrided-steel palette, the sculpture serif feels refined and quiet — exactly the personality PANArt carries. It is an invention and a craft rather than a logo, mirroring a hand-made steel instrument. (PANArt’s real logo, its “Hang” wordmark and the Hang’s distinctive shape are things we describe but do not reproduce, and the exact typeface is not ours to use.) Because it is not ours to use, the honest description is “a sculpture-serif spirit,” shown here in a stand-in. The type behaves like the workshop: refined, quiet and inventive.

PANArt stands for the workshop that invented an instrument.

PANArt closes the new makers with the purest version of the round’s idea: a maker whose identity is an invention. A nitrided-steel palette, a sculpture serif and a hand-made steel instrument make one thing — the inventors of the Hang — the whole identity: inventive, Swiss and hand-made. The invention of the Hang is the differentiator, and the family of successor instruments is the meaning. The point is a Swiss workshop that, where the last round’s houses inherited a craft and this round’s other makers rethought one, created a genuinely new instrument — and then kept evolving it.

Put to work, the identity is invention, honestly told, as design. A workshop in this spirit would create rather than iterate, hand-make it at home, and be scrupulous about the language — the Hang invented in 2000, a shift to successor instruments around 2013, hand-made in Switzerland, the “Hang” a trademark and “handpan” the generic class others coined. A brand learning from it would see that invention is the most powerful identity of all — that a maker who gave the world a new instrument holds a place no imitator can — and that being precise about the trademark, never implying other makers’ handpans are PANArt’s, and acknowledging the steelpan roots respectfully, is what keeps the story honest. PANArt is where the round’s spirit peaks: Strandberg and NS Design rethought an instrument, Backun and Erica Synths modernised one, and PANArt invented one outright — the fullest answer to what a new maker can be. There is discipline in the care the naming demands: an inventor’s credibility rests on claiming only the original, and letting the whole later class of handpans belong to the many makers who followed. The lesson PANArt teaches is that invention can hold an identity: the new instrument gives it substance, and the honesty about the trademark and the successors keeps it credible. The invention is the personality, and the hand-made Hang is the proof.

For designers and brand-builders, PANArt closes the new makers, from Switzerland: invent the thing, and be precise about the name. The lessons: create rather than copy; hand-make it; separate your trademark from the generic term; claim only the original; acknowledge your influences respectfully; and never reproduce a logo or the instrument’s shape. It is also a reminder to stay precise: PANArt is the Swiss workshop of Felix Rohner and Sabina Schärer that invented the Hang in 2000 and now hand-makes a family of successor sound sculptures in Bern — with the palette here an unofficial interpretation. PANArt made invention the identity — proof that a workshop that gave the world a new instrument, honestly told, can be the difference.

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