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Luxury Cooking Products Heat Up The Architectural Digest Show

NEW YORK –

Major appliances made a strong showing
at last month’s 11th annual Architectural Digest Home
Design Show (ADHDS), one of the country’s largest exhibits
of luxury home products.

A contingent of premium majap manufacturers including
Jenn-Air, Sub-Zero/Wolf and U-Line, and distributors
Almo and Eastern Marketing, joined a list of 400 exhibitors
at Manhattan’s Pier 94 show space, which was
expected to draw some 40,000 consumers, designers,
architects and majap dealers.

Many within the white-goods brigade said the event
serves as a high-end adjunct – or even an alternative –
to the Kitchen/Bath Industry Show (K/BIS), which has
diminished as a primary platform for white-goods introductions.

Frank Sorrentino, New York sales and marketing VP
for Sub-Zero Wolf East, the manufacturer’s East Coast
distribution arm, said the company has exhibited at ADHDS
for the past three years in lieu of K/BIS, but is having
an expanded presence at both shows this season
now that the economy is recovering.

“It’s a premier show,” he said of ADHDS, “and gives
us great exposure.” Sub-Zero/Wolf used the opportunity
to showcase a new steam convection oven; its black
glass E series 30-inch double and single wall ovens; its
outdoor refrigeration, cooking and icemaker line; and a
built-in French door fridge with internal ice and water
dispenser in 42- and 48-inch widths.

Brian Maynard, brand marketing director for premium
Whirlpool brand Jenn-Air, said ADHDS has become the
nation’s largest appliance show by default. Attendance
by the trade has also made it a key venue for Jenn-Air,
which is two years into a repositioning campaign to revive
its brand awareness as a luxury nameplate.

For this year’s show Jenn-Air doubled the size of its
exhibit space and launched a first-of-its-kind iPhone app
that lets users see how its products will look in their
kitchens. The effort paid off with a Best In Show award
from the American Society of Interior Designers within
the kitchen category.

U-Line, the 50-year-old undercounter refrigeration resource,
used the show to introduce new additions to its
Modular 3000 Series of solid- and glass-door refrigerators,
wine coolers and beverage centers. New products
include 24-inch models to accommodate like-sized cabinets,
and an 18-inch clear ice maker.

“Today’s kitchens are being used in much more versatile
ways,” president Jennifer Uihlein said in a statement.
“The traditional ‘working triangle’ kitchen is becoming a
thing of the past.”

At Almo’s booth, the distributor’s specialty appliance
division showcased a 30-inch bottom mount fully integrated
refrigerator from Liebherr; a new dual-fuel option
for Capital Cooking’s Connoisseurian series ranges and
a new 10-color palette for its Precision range and Maestro
wall oven lines; laundry products by Asko; ventilation
products from Faber; and Sharp’s extensive Insight
Pro microwave oven line, which Almo has been selected
to distribute exclusively in the U.S. outside the Southeast
and Hawaii.

Drawing crowds at the Eastern Marketing display was
the new home oven line from Wood Stone. Typically
found in commercial applications including the Cosi and
California Pizza Kitchen chains, and in the kitchens of
celebrity chefs Tom Colicchio and Wolfgang Puck and
the offices of Steven Spielberg, the residential version
can reach a temperature of 1,200 degrees F and a retail
range of $15,000 to $20,000, Eastern Marketing president
Marty Friedman reported.

Also debuting at the distributor’s booth was an electric
version of Aga’s ultra-premium – and traditionally
gas-fueled – cast iron oven line from England. The electric
“total control” model, developed for warmer climes
where owners prefer a shorter cool-down time, will carry
a $5,000 premium over its $10,000 (with installation)
predecessor, which chief executive William McGrath said is a favorite of the Royal Family, Prime
Minister David Cameron and other notable
Brits, including Sir Paul McCartney, actors
Kate Winslet, Colin Firth and Elizabeth
Hurley, and celebrity chef Jamie Oliver.

Elsewhere at the show, Kalamazoo Outdoor
Gourmet introduced an assortment of
12 hybrid fire grills that combine the convenience
of a gas grill, the superior heat
characteristics of a charcoal grill and the
flavor of a wood grill or smoker, the company
said. Available in four sizes, suggested
retails range from $9,995 to $26,195.

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