Kitchen Sync Modern Conveniences Help Shape Today’S State-Of-The-Art Homes

Convenience, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. What one person considers an ideal solution others may find unworkable.

Take, for instance, the kitchen in the South Hill bungalow Tom Tremaine and Sally Pritchard bought 18 years ago.

Whoever remodeled it in the late 1960s must have thought their money well-spent. But when Tremaine was asked recently what worked best in it, he turned to his wife and replied, “Did anything work in the old kitchen?”

Times change, and so do expectations. Today, area residents spend more than ever making their kitchens and bathrooms state-of-the-art.

Even so, local designers, contractors and retailers predict homes will look and “act” differently in the next few years, as more efficient appliances and assorted “smart house” features become affordable.

How did our ancestors manage without “modern conveniences”?

Perhaps a better question is this: How long before future generations ask the same about us?

In his book “The Comforts of Home: The American House and the Evolution of Modern Convenience,” social historian Merritt Ierley points out that every generation considers its own time “the pinnacle of achievement.”

An article published soon after the Civil War celebrated the numerous innovations available to the wealthy - central heat, water closets, speaking tubes and dumb-waiters - “embellishment which makes a modern private dwelling so far in advance even of the fairy palaces of the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments.”

Yet most American homes at the time lacked running water and kitchen sinks. And while some well-offs were installing central heat, future President Theodore Roosevelt’s wife lamented that keeping the family’s new house comfortable was like “trying to heat a birdcage.”

As recently as a century ago, Ierley writes, most American homes “still relied on kitchen and parlor stoves for heat, kerosene lamps for light, portable tubs for bathing and laundering, and outdoor privies for bathrooms.”

Late-19th-century futurist A.E. Kennelly correctly envisioned thermostatically controlled heat and air conditioning, smoke and burglar alarms, and electrically powered carpet sweepers, sewing machines and automatic door openers.

On the other hand, he also predicted “a miniature train track (that) runs round the (dining room) table, within easy reach of each guest.” On it would operate “little trucks fitted with tiny motors (that) are started out from the pantry to the dinner-table. They stop automatically before each guest, who, after assisting himself, presses a button at his side and so gives the car the impetus and right of way to his next neighbor.”

By the mid-1920s, when Tremaine and Pritchard’s Spokane home was built, American ingenuity had given us what we generally recognize today as a modern kitchen.

Here’s how a 1927 article in The New York Times described it: “The old notion that the kitchen had to be a luxuriously large room of the house is passing. A small, compact kitchen, where steps are routed and tools grouped, not only makes kitchen work less fatiguing but promotes health and happiness.”

Tremaine and Pritchard’s house later acquired a 1960s interpretation of convenience: electric range; recirculating range hood; gold-flecked laminate countertops.

“I’m sure it was a substantial improvement over the original kitchen, which had about half the counter space,” Tremaine says.

“The layout was functional,” says Pritchard. “But there was very little light. And one of the burners didn’t work.”

Tremaine and Pritchard knew they could make the kitchen more convenient. But child-rearing and various home-improvement projects took priority for 10 years.

Last summer they finally found the time, money and energy to undertake a major overhaul.

With the help of Kitchens By Contardo and contractor Scott Guttman, they removed a wall to open the kitchen to the family room. They also rearranged windows, and greatly enhanced the room’s artificial light.

They installed a six-burner gas cooktop on an exterior wall, so it could easily vent outside. And the couple specifically chose a range that works without electricity, in case we ever see Ice Storm II.

New Shaker-style cabinets with roll-out shelves enhance the kitchen’s storage space, and granite countertops provide attractive, durable work space.

Their new Bosch dishwasher is quieter than their old model. And their Sub-Zero refrigerator, with its freezer below, allows convenient access to frequently used items.

The project took four months instead of the optimistic estimate of four weeks. But the basic design is the same one the couple roughed out on paper 10 years ago.

Will it fit the needs of some future homeowner 30 years hence?

Tremaine and Pritchard don’t know. But then, that wasn’t their goal.

“We knew what we wanted,” explains Tremaine.“We weren’t so concerned about resale.”

That’s why the kitchen sink ended up where it did - on an inside wall.

Recalls Pritchard, “One contractor who came to give us a bid looked at the plans and told us, `You can’t put the sink on an inside wall! You’ll want to sell this house someday, and the housewife always wants a window over the sink.”’

After a decade of thoughtful planning, the sink stayed. The contractor went.

Yes, indeed, times do change.