That's No Ordinary Appliance
10/14/04
The last few year has seen an explosion of innovation in the home appliance market. Everything from washing machines to dishwashers to ovens and refridgerators have been made over in unexpected ways. Once largely an issue of styling, take a look at what happens when designers and engineers decide to change the function of these common household devices.

Maytag got into the game with the Gemini, an oven which has two separate parts so that you can cook a pizza and casserole, or chicken and vegetables at two separate temperatures. In order to do this, the designers had to recognize that the large space in the oven wasn't really being used, as most people don't cook large lots of dinner at once anymore. Instead, they were able to give the users back some time by combining cooking tasks
Then Whirlpool joined in with the an oven which refrigerates as well as cooking. This lets busy parents put in a meal when they leave at noon to do the errands, and have it piping hot and cooked when they bring the kids home five hours later. Again, the designers realized that time was the commodity, not crazy cooking ability.
freezer/oven
Sadly not available in the US yet, the Dyson CR01 dual drum washing machine is another time fighter. By using two counter-rotating drums, the clothes in the laundry are more efficiently bent and beaten about in the water, which allows all kinds of good stuff: Lower water usage, lower detergent usage, and shorter wash cycles to boot. Dyson hopes this will shake things up the same way his vacuums did almost 10 years ago.
In a different vein, Kitchenaid's Briva aims to change the inconvenience of having a giant dishwasher in a kitchen. By creating an in-sink washer, they are acknowledging the fact that people with smaller or no families could still use the help of a good dishwasher.
On the experimental front, even more amazing things are cooking. Some students from the University of New South Wales have developed a consumer-grade dishwasher which uses supercritical CO2 to clean dishes. In this state, the gas becomes a powerful solvent, dissolving food and grease easily. Similar technology is use to ensure that space probes do not contaminate other planets. Woah.
Who knows what else is on the horizon; family structures are changing, and with them, appliance use preferences. What will the appliances be in the next 20 years, and how will they help us cope with our new social choices? It's up to designers to work that out.
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Dominic Muren and IDFuel Team