Elevate Your Kitchen with Luxury Appliances (2/4)

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Of all the home improvement projects, no other captures the hearts of potential home buyers quite like a house with a high-end kitchen. All of those gleaming appliances, sleek countertops and hand-crafted cabinets are enough to make you swoon. Over the years, the significance of the kitchen has evolved. With many homes now featuring open floor plans and wide spaces, it has morphed into the epicenter of the home, the place where everyone gathers, conversations begin, and meals, laughs and memories are shared. In fact, today’s luxury home kitchens are a blend of functionality, creativity and experimentation. Given their multi-purpose role, it is no surprise these culinary wonderlands are in such high demand. A complete kitchen overhaul is not only important to buyers, but if done right, a kitchen remodel can also help increase resale value and differentiate your home from others in the area.

With a virtually endless number of design selections, when it comes to renovating a kitchen, one of the most important is choosing your appliances. Whether you are a food connoisseur, a self-proclaimed home chef or someone who just appreciates the art of a finely designed and luxuriously appointed kitchen, having high-quality appliances is a key ingredient in any successful kitchen remodel. Not only do they make cooking easier and more efficient, but luxury appliances can elevate your cooking and kitchen experience – including design, functionality and even energy-saving elements.

With a wide variety of up-scale appliance brands to choose from, it is important to do your research before you make your selections. Below are some of the most popular and well-respected brands to explore that can help you transform your kitchen and take it from drab to fab.

• Gaggenau – At every stage of Gaggenau’s appliance production, a craftsperson examines their work using hand and eye, seeking imperfections. This constant quality control protects an exceptional reputation built by hand since 1683. In over 330 years of constant change, they have learned that there are only three sacred constants in the production of the exceptional: the vision of the designer, the quality of materials and the skill of the craftsperson. Their appliances, including ovens, cooktops, dishwashers, refrigerators, coffee machines, ventilation and more, are designed to perform exceptionally, inspiring the private chef to create masterpieces as accomplished as those emerging from the professional kitchen, a place that also just happens to be Gaggenau’s inspiration.

• ILVE – Italians are renowned the world over for their passion for design. Combined with exquisite craftsmanship, this has produced some of the most desirable products and iconic brands. That same passion and craftsmanship is what drove ILVE’s founders, Eugenio Illoti and Evelino Berno, to create their first commercial cooker in 1952. Word spread quickly and soon, there was a demand from passionate home cooks for a domestic product as good as their original commercial cookers. ILVE has come a long way since those early days. Their cooking appliances are now amongst the world’s finest and can be found in some of the most sophisticated homes throughout the globe. And not just for their beautiful design either. The consistent blue flame of solid brass burners, the cool touch of an oven door and the delight of teppanyaki cooking are all testimony to the brand’s exceptional attention to detail. In short, a passion for innovation and craftsmanship permeates everything they do. Offering a wide array of options to choose from, you can create custom appliances that are truly your own.

• Viking – One of the most popular premium American brands on the appliance market, Viking offers a vast line of ranges, refrigerators, dishwashers, microwaves and hoods, each appliance incorporating the highest quality materials and providing unsurpassed reliability. With a dedication to innovation and the development of new technologies, Viking has worked tirelessly over the years to set the benchmark on quality, continuously improving the quality, performance and functionality of their products. A leader in luxury appliances for 40 years, their products have been re-engineered to ensure the best performance, safety and durability. In fact, since becoming part of Middleby Corporation, Viking has created more than 50 new innovative and award-winning products. Collectively, they have made hundreds of design, production and feature improvements to their refrigerators, ranges and dishwashers. Viking’s Delta Hue line and Tuscany Series provide numerous color and style options for their cooking suites. You can even match your cooking appliances with Viking panel-ready refrigerators and dishwashers, helping every Viking appliance contribute to the aesthetic of your designer kitchen.

• Miele – There are many good reasons for choosing Miele. Since the company’s founding in 1899, Miele has remained true to its “Immer Besser” brand promise. This means that they will do all that they can to be “Immer Besser” (forever better) than their competitors and “Immer Besser” (forever better) than they already are. For their customers, this means “the peace of mind of knowing that choosing Miele is a good decision – and probably the decision of a lifetime.” Their precision engineering assures their top-of-the-line kitchen appliances exceed expectations in both operation and aesthetics. Extremely durable design features, including scratch-resistance, fingerprint-resistance, smudge-resistance, soft-closing hinges, continuous cast iron grates, dishwasher-safe filters and more, ensure their products are built to last. 

• Café – GE’s line of luxury home appliances, the entire kitchen suite, from their commercial-style ranges down to their small appliances such as espresso makers, all come in several color options. Their Customizable Professional Collection also features several metallic handles and bezel options to cater to your preferred style. And for your convenience, they offer hardware kits that let you replace your handle and bezel options at any time without replacing the whole appliance. Your aesthetic tastes may vary from year to year, but thanks to Café, your appliances don’t have to change with them. In terms of performance, these appliances operate with the same level of flair that their exteriors present. For example, select cooking appliances come with a Steakhouse Mode – a three-stage process (heat, sear, rest) that gives you edge-to-edge uniformity and a browned, flavorful finish. Delicious!

• Thermador – Boasting a legacy of innovation in the kitchen and beyond, Thermador is one of the oldest American appliance companies still churning out superior, high-end appliances. With over 100 years of experience, they’ve been innovators in the industry from the start, being the first appliance manufacturer to introduce America to the concept of the cooktop, as well as completely reinventing food preservation with their personalized column refrigeration system. One of their most popular innovations is the Star® Burner, which provides more even heating and flame coverage than any other burner type. When it comes to shopping for luxury appliances, Thermador is a brand to consider when furnishing a high-end kitchen.

• Bertazzoni – Since Bertazzoni was founded in 1882, the company has always understood that the kitchen is at the heart of family life. For over 135 years, Bertazzoni’s beautifully engineered and designed cooking appliances have followed the guiding principles of Italian founder Francesco Bertazzoni. His love of food, family and engineering inspired him to design and manufacture some of the most advanced appliances for the kitchen. Since then, the six ensuing generations have done the same, continuing to progress and becoming one of the most well-regarded appliance manufacturers in the industry. Utilizing the most up-to-date building methods and developing precision features to assist even the most ardent home chef, many feel their products are more than worth the top-shelf pricing.

• JennAire – Starting out, JennAire was a company that only made fan units. Since then Jenn-Aire has gone on to become one of the largest and most widely recognized kitchen appliance brands. Founded in 1965, Lou Jenn started JennAir to defy conventional design and bring downdraft ventilation to residential kitchens. With this innovation, architects and interior designers were given enormous freedom in reimagining how to create an open kitchen. Along with the advent of smart technology, JennAir has become a top contender in the field of smart integration. JennAir range hoods can retreat discreetly into your countertops. Smartphone technology guides you with step-by-step recipes to precisely tailor culinary adventures to your preferences, even utilizing smart home managers like Amazon Alexa. Connected temperature probes alert you when your dish is done without opening your JennAir oven’s door, and precision sensors in your JennAir refrigerator ensure humidity levels are maintained and consistent in whatever compartment you store your food. Rest assured, knowing any JennAir appliances you pick will perform as beautifully on the inside as they look on the outside.

• Dacor – The story of Dacor begins in California in 1965. From the very beginning, their aim was clear—create distinctive appliances rooted in style and driven by innovation. Today, that mission still powers everything they do. They seek to elevate the art of living well. Designed with exceptional materials, Dacor blends precision performance with meaningful innovation, delivering heightened experiences to make your home truly unique—their cooking appliances sport durable brass burners, which contrast beautifully on graphite stainless steel surfaces. Meanwhile, Illumina™ Burner Controls glow Dacor’s signature flame-blue™ for a stylish effect that doubles as a safety feature, alerting you when a burner is active. Dacor refrigerators are equipped with Digital Inverter technology which maintains consistent performance and minimizes temperature fluctuations. They’re also stunning to behold, thanks to artisan craftsmanship which utilizes raw materials and sophisticated finishing methods to match any kitchen design or concept.

• Monogram – Aspiring to redefine the world of luxury appliances, Monogram is a top manufacturer of high-end home appliances with a philosophy built on three supporting pillars: materials, performance and ownership. With each of these tenets in mind, they have continued to innovate and develop an ever-improving line of products for the home, all of which reflect Monogram’s determination to offer consumers the highest-quality products that operate at peak efficiency without fail. Materials used in the manufacturing of their appliances include commercial-grade stainless steel on fridges, unscratchable sapphire glass on cooktop control knobs, and durable, marine-grade bearings on their dishwasher racks. Monogram’s appliance performance is unparalleled thanks to industry-exclusive hearth oven ventilation filters, chain-driven French oven doors and porcelain-enameled oven racks that resist scratches.

• Wolf, Sub-Zero, Cove  – Founded by Westye Bakke in 1945, Sub-Zero was one of many refrigeration manufacturers in North America. With a strategy to build the best, highest quality refrigeration, Sub-Zero built an iconic brand that, over time, has become synonymous with luxury and performance. Inspired by Westye’s desire to create and deliver the best products, Sub-Zero has never compromised on quality. The materials are premium grade, the technologies are state of the art and the craftsmanship is of the caliber expected in the world’s finest homes. Building on Sub-Zero’s success, in 2000, Sub-Zero introduced Wolf cooking appliances, bringing professional temperature control into the hands of home cooks with an impressive fifty-product launch. Refined by more than eight decades of commercial kitchen experience, the technology, durability and design of Wolf make it the ideal kitchen companion to Sub-Zero. And in 2018, Sub-Zero introduced Cove dishwashing, the culmination of decades of research, testing and technology to ensure sparkling clean and dry dishes with every wash. Like Wolf, Cove was created in the same spirit of quality and innovation as Sub-Zero—and similarly serves as a single-focused kitchen specialist. Together, the Sub-Zero, Wolf and Cove brands are dedicated to helping create functional, flexible and beautiful dream kitchens and are found in many of the world’s most spectacular homes.  

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