For a product with no GI tract to speak of, the iPad sure comes with a lot of buts. “I love it for surfing on the couch, but…” or “I love it for writing my emails, but…” These aren’t even necessarily flaws with the iPad itself, but a difference in the scope Apple imagines for the product and the user imagines for a product.

Some people don’t just want to draw, they want to paint. And some people don’t just want to watch movies, they want to listen to them, too.

The Brydge is yet another runaway Kickstarter project that scratches one of those iPad consumer itches–namely, those who want to type on an iPad with all the elegance they do on their laptops.

It’s a clip-on iPad keyboard with a milled aluminum chassis and integrated speaker that ostensibly converts the iPad into a MacBook. Other products like this exist, but Brydge is a bit more minimal than the others, and doesn’t fall into the trap of trying to make the iPad look exactly like a Macbook Air:

“We love the Apple products’ aesthetics, but when it comes to the iPad it felt like every keyboard or case is made from cheap materials, didn’t offer any range of iPad positioning or completely covered the entire iPad. Brydge was designed to complement the iPad, to improve productivity and enjoyment of the device,” explains Sam Gordon, one of Brydge’s three creators. “Because it’s made of aluminum, the costs to manufacture Brydge are high–we turned to Kickstarter to raise the necessary capital to do manufacturing run. We also wanted to test the market and see if there was room for a high-quality aluminum keyboard.”

Apprently there is some room in the market for that premium keyboard. In a week, Brydge raised over $400,000, promising units at an introductory price of $150 (about the same cost as a refurbished Kindle Fire).

You could call it beginner’s luck for a project pioneered by just three Menlo Park designers (Sam Gordon, Brad Leong, Eddy Vromen) who don’t even have a collective studio behind them. But the thing is, the Brydge is the group’s second successful Kickstarter product. Previous to it, Gordon and Leong raised over $130,000 for an iPhone stand called the Oona. Corporate or not, there’s a strange and wonderful alchemy going on between these designers.