Jo Bethea had stainless steel appliances in the kitchen of her previous home, but she never really liked them.
Still, when kitchen designer Deanna Carleton suggested a dramatic black glass refrigerator for the kitchen renovation of her current Tudor-style home in Silver Lake, Bethea hesitated.
She thought it might be too much black. She even hung a black curtain in the space to help her envision it.
Now she’s glad she took the leap.
“Everybody loves it who sees it,” Bethea said. The refrigerator brings interest to her eclectic kitchen, she said, and its stainless steel handles blend with the stainless sink and stove. Even the refrigerator’s tendency to show fingerprints doesn’t bother her, because it’s easy to clean.
Appliance manufacturers are betting there are a lot of other Jo Betheas out there, people who don’t care for stainless or crave something new. Those manufacturers are coming out with new colors and finishes they hope will whet consumers’ appetite for change.
After all, car buyers want sexy finishes, product designer Pat Schiavone notes. Why shouldn’t appliance buyers?
“I firmly believe that people care just as much about what’s in their homes as what’s in their garages,” said Schiavone, a Silver Lake native who once designed vehicles for Ford Motor Co. and is now vice president for global consumer design at Whirlpool Corp. His team recently introduced kitchen appliance colors called Black Ice and White Ice, high-gloss metal finishes that are richer than standard black and white.
Whirlpool’s Ice collection grew out of Schiavone’s conviction that appliances should be just as beautiful as the other objects in our homes, especially now that the kitchen has become such a central living area.
Black Ice and White Ice are an attempt to make black and white sexy, he said. Now he and his design team are looking at warmer earth tones in a bid to develop other finishes and colors that look good with wood cabinets and fit well into people’s homes, he said.
GE recently tossed its ante into the appliance-color game with Slate, a dark bronzy gray with a matte finish. The company introduced it this month as a direct challenger to stainless.
“We thought there was a need for something beyond stainless steel,” said Chris Bissig, manager of concept and brand development for GE Appliances. The finish was developed to be a neutral complement to many of the colors and materials that are popular in homes today, such as stone countertops and hardwood and slate floors, he said.
The low-sheen finish also follows a trend in high-end automotive design, Bissig said. And it has a practical aspect: It resists fingerprints, a common complaint about stainless steel.
Stainless stands out in a kitchen, whereas Slate is meant to blend in, he said. The color also works well with stainless steel, black or white appliances, so it’s a good choice for consumers who need to replace an appliance but can’t afford to replace them all, said Julie Wood, the company’s manager of appliances public relations.
But will consumers take the bait? Are the days of stainless steel appliances numbered?
Kitchen designers aren’t so sure.
“People are still buying stainless,” said Carleton, the designer from Bath Township’s Kitchen Design Group who created Bethea’s kitchen with its black-glass refrigerator. Even when consumers don’t especially like stainless steel, they’ll buy it because they believe stainless-steel appliances are essential to their homes’ resale value, she said.
That’s also been the experience of Debra Shababy of Studio 76 Kitchens and Baths in Twinsburg.
“You know, they [clients] always ask me about stainless, and they’ve been asking me for 10 years,” she said. Stainless steel is neutral, she said, “and it looks updated.”
Even at Viking Range Corp., a company known for its colorful, high-end appliances, stainless is still the overwhelming preference, said Brent Bailey, its director of design. More than 80 percent of the kitchen appliances it sells are stainless steel, and it’s been that way for more than 15 years, he said.
Bailey said even those who don’t choose stainless tend to go with graphite gray, stone gray or taupe, colors that have a more professional feel than, say, cobalt or apple red. Maybe a customer will choose a kitchen range in a punchy color to make a statement, he said, but most people see their appliances as investments and choose colors with more staying power.
Nevertheless, Wood said GE is convinced the time is ripe for change.
Trends in home design and color tend to undergo major shifts every 15 or 20 years, she said, and that’s about how long stainless steel has been riding a wave of popularity.
“We think this is the time when people are going to want something different,” she said.
Weaning people from stainless steel will be a challenge, Whirlpool’s Schiavone conceded. In 2011, stainless steel appliances accounted for 35.3 percent of appliances sold, second only to white at 42.3 percent, according to figures from the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers.
But Schiavone thinks appliance makers just haven’t tried hard enough to develop other sophisticated options.
“I’m absolutely convinced that if we build it, they will come,” he said.
Mary Beth Breckenridge can be reached at 330-996-3756 or mbrecken@thebeaconjournal.com. You can also become a fan on Facebook at http://tinyurl.com/mbbreck, follow her on Twitter @MBBreckenridge and read her blog at www.ohio.com/blogs/mary-beth.
