posted on May 16, 2007 10:43:57 PM new
Big surprise! No politics from me tonight. We have a small galley kitchen which works well for me--but the appliances are beginning to show their age. The dishwasher is an apartment size, 18" wide, and we're stuck with that size, or we'd have almost no lower-cupboard space.
My question is this: The smaller dishwasher comes in three color choices--black, white, or stainless steel. I want all the appliances to match--stove, dishwasher, and refrigerator.
I'm leaning toward the stainless steel, since the black appliances would be too overpowering in that small space, and white appliances wouldn't go with the cupboards, which are a soft beige, too close to white.
However, I've heard that the stainless steel is hard to keep clean. Is that true? If you have it, how do you clean it? Do you need special cleaners?
The stainless steel sink is, to me, a horror, showing every waterspot. It will be replaced too. I just don't know what way to go on this. Thanks for any advice you have to offer. ~Adele in a quandary
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There is more to life than increasing its speed. --Mahatma Gandhi
posted on May 17, 2007 04:11:38 AM new
Hey, Adele! There was a time that I wanted all stainless steel appliances. I've since changed my mind. I hate trying to keep the stainless sink looking good and I also have stainless containers (for sugar, etc.) on my counter that always look like they need to be cleaned even though they don't. So, I guess it would depend upon how much time you want to spend keeping the appliances looking like new. I know this wasn't much help.
posted on May 17, 2007 04:45:31 AM new
I thought they made applicances with stainless steel that don't need to be polished anymore. Refrigerators and the like???
posted on May 17, 2007 05:20:52 AM new
Stainless steel looks great when you can devote a lot of time to keeping it clean. I have a stainless steel microwave and a stainless steel and black enamel stove and oven and they are a nightmare. They show every speck of dust and the minute you touch them fingerprints seem to blossom all over. I would go with the white, can be nice with beige cupboards, and then get some colorful accessories - canister set, towels, etc.
Good luck,
Jane
posted on May 17, 2007 05:29:16 AM new
Stainless can be a pain -- wiz. all the products they make to keep it fingerprint-free and streak-less. New appliance lines offer brushed finishes that take care of that problem I believe. I know Sears offers one line.
Besides, if you ever want to sell your house, everyone equates stainless with high end, white with tired. Watch HGTV House Hunters some time!
posted on May 17, 2007 05:51:10 AM new
hey adele I have a stainless refrigerator. It's a PITA.....BUT I just recently bought those stainless cleaner cloths in a container like baby wipes or something and those things are the BOMB! It's sooooo much easier. I'd been using the spray can stainless cleaner and paper towels but I finally broke down and thought I'd just pay a little more and try the other and I'm glad I did. I use them on my outside grills too.
You can get stainless now that is "fingerprint" free or something like that.
So you can live with stainless but just be prepared to spend a little more time cleaning it. It does look good but it's a fad like green, brown and orange was - remember those?
There are also products out there in which you can change the color of your appliances.
Have you heard about appliance paint to change a white dishwasher into a color that would me more appropriate in your kitchen.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/55093/update_your_kitchen_for_under_100_with.html
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
posted on May 17, 2007 07:17:07 AM new
what is WORSE than stainless IMHO is glass top stove that is BLACK. never ever buy black - it is like polishing a mirror only worse.
posted on May 17, 2007 08:01:32 AM new
White appliances...and paint those cupboards YELLOW! Bright "Good Morning this is a kitchen" YELLOW!! You will think your kitchen grew! Beige is for clothes and Martha Stewart.
posted on May 17, 2007 08:39:57 AM new
You guys are wonderful. Thank you so much! Yes, I've watched those House Hunters shows and always yelled at the TV when a young couple just starting out act like brats about perfectly decent homes. They'll walk into a kitchen and say, well, we'll just have to GUT THIS ROOM, I MUST have stainless appliances, I MUST have granite countertops. A decorator friend of mine says both of those items will go out of favor in a few years and really date a kitchen. When we all started out, many years ago, we used our creativity to make our first home work for us; I don't understand the current group of young marrieds--at least not the ones I see on the TV shows.
However, I'd love to hear from someone who has the brushed stainless steel appliances.
The walls in our entryway, stairwell, living room, dining room, and kitchen are all variations (darker or lighter) of a wonderful color I will describe as an adobe color. Not orange, not yellow, not red. Hard to describe. We adore it, and it goes with our Indian rugs on the walls.
Because of this, I really can't use a bright color, like yellow, for the cupboards. I suppose one solution would be to repaint the cupboards white, to go with white appliances.
The room will eventually need new flooring and countertops, which are now an old beige formica, but first things first. MUST have a working dishwasher!
Again, thanks a million for all your messages here. Keep 'em coming, if you have better ideas. Adele
_____________________
There is more to life than increasing its speed. --Mahatma Gandhi
posted on May 17, 2007 08:58:10 AM new
Ok,OK, no bright yellow but a gentle teasing ?????
I agree about young people wanting so much right NOW and not planning for the future.
You MUST have a dishwasher? You do.......there's one on your right arm and one on your left arm
posted on May 17, 2007 09:19:46 AM new
It doesn't surprise me that most young couples buying their first home have higher expectations than many of us did.
They're more highly educated professionals...more so than most in those days were...they're two income professionals who are paying approx. 10-40 times what we did for our first homes.
They are correct to have higher expectations at those prices.
We didn't have high expectations for our first home....BUT we only paid $21,000.00 for it too.
posted on May 17, 2007 09:53:09 AM new
Too much chrome,stainless steel makes your home like a hospital.
Too cold !
Do you care if it matches the rest of your house?
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Lets all stop whining !
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posted on May 17, 2007 09:59:59 AM new
I do janitorial cleaning for a living. We have an account at a Gas company that has all stainless appliances with a black stove. All this was put in new and I found the only way to clean the sinks was to scrub them out with Dawn dish washing liquid,rinse them real good and buff them dry. We use a waterless stainless steel cleaner on the appliances, except the stove. I found glass cleaner does the best job on that. If you add a few drops of Dawn to your glass cleaner it works a lot better.
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posted on May 17, 2007 10:55:55 AM new
Hey, Classic! I guess I have nothing better to do. It's been too cold here the last couple of days. This is the only area I know of that can be 90 one day and 50 the next!
posted on May 17, 2007 01:49:38 PM new
Mingo: Yes, I NEED a dishwasher! We're handwashing the dishes right now and it's a pain. The apartment-size is perfect for the two of us; I don't cook big production-type meals anyway and wash my pots and pans manually, so we just need to run the little dishwasher every other day.
MAH: I am WAY WAY WAY too lazy to go to all that effort to keep an appliance clean! Such work, for something that will go out of style in a few years! I think re: the kitchen sink, I've had good luck in past homes with not marring the white porcelain much, and it's probably easier to have that and need to replace it in 10-15 years, than a stainless sink that shows everything including CLEAN water drops!
Linda: I was pretty sure you'd ring in on this sooner or later. I have to tell you that when we were house shopping for our first home, in 1965, we were young professionals too and could have afforded something fancier but weren't spoiled brats about it. What I'm yelling to those couples on TV is, "Get the danged house if it's perfect for you except for the non-perfect kitchen, live with it for awhile, make sure you're paying your bills on time, and then remodel if you want to. Don't act like the world owes you a living and should know you'll accept nothing but THE BEST."
Thank God all our kids bought homes for less than they could afford, according to the realtors--and then started college funds for their children. First things first.
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There is more to life than increasing its speed. --Mahatma Gandhi
posted on May 17, 2007 02:41:40 PM new Don't act like the world owes you a living and should know you'll accept nothing but THE BEST."
Who can afford to think like that?...especially today when the price of an average sized house is over a half a million. When you said "first things first", the first thing that came to mind was the cost of housing in a good school district.
Add my vote to those who prefer white! Stainless looks better in a very large kitchen that is seldom used.
posted on May 17, 2007 02:58:32 PM new
Helen: I see young couples with a strict budget, house hunting on that cable TV show. Let's say their budget is "no more than $450,000." The house they buy is shown to them by a realtor without hopes of a sale, but the couple buys it for $500,000 AND guts the kitchen immediately.
No wonder there are so many failed mortgages these days.
_____________________
There is more to life than increasing its speed. --Mahatma Gandhi
posted on May 17, 2007 03:46:26 PM new
Well, roadsmith, I'm sure those professional couples are glad you aren't in charge of their finances, nor their choices to do whatever THEY want to their own home, with their OWN money. LOL
If the liberal schools and their parents taught them well enough....they won't make the wrong choices....just DIFFERENT choices than you'd have made. And making 'different' choices than YOU did doesn't make them brats.
That's what's nice about not dictating to ADULTS what THEY 'should' or 'shouldn't do.
Roadsmith, rather than the cost of remodeling a kitchen, the real problem is caused by risky and exotic mortgage loans. Millions of Americans are at risk of losing their homes.
There are a number of foreclosures in our newspaper every day.
I just did a LOT of kitchen research before putting in a new floor. Came across many opinions concerning stainless steel appliances. The consensus was they are a PITA to keep looking nice and will be dated in a few years. (Along with the obligatory $50+ per square foot granite countertops and pricey cherry cabinets that look like furniture.)
Adele, I think the key is to consider your home as a whole. The style of the adjoining rooms, things like that. Then decide what kind of appliances you want. If it's contemporary the stainless might be okay as long as you're willing to deal with the upkeep. Personally, I'd stay with white.
In my 1929 Mediterranean stucco, the kitchen, which I suspect was redone in the late 1940s, has white painted wood china cabinets with glass doors. Big 1940s Roper range. The old white Sears sink base I had reglazed. Although there are some black touches, the other appliances are white. Countertops are maple butcher block. The BRAND NEW FLOOR is (drumroll please...) RED linoleum! Not vinyl - the real deal old-fashioned Armstrong linoleum.
Bottom line - the linoleum is right for the era of the home. Ditto the white appliances. And the creamy yellow I used on the walls. It would be completely absurd to put contemporary design in my old house.
Now if I can just get that darn black Z-brick over the stove painted. What kind of psycho puts black Z-brick in an old kitchen? Yikes!!
posted on May 17, 2007 04:24:48 PM new
I have a question on washer-
how do I get rid of the sud in my washer?
See,according to my manual,cheap detergent yields too much sud and the washer goes on forever,I tried second spin,extra rinse and spin and the sud is still there.
I finally took the wash to the bathtub and rinse them out by hands and hang them in the backyard like in the 50s and 60s.
But how do I get rid of the sud in the washer for the next wash??
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Lets all stop whining !
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posted on May 17, 2007 04:32:31 PM new
My favorite kitchen is white cupboards with white appliances because it looks bright and clean and always seems to be in style. Colored bowls and other accessories look great with it. Lucy, I think red and yellow look super with white.
I've watched some of the shows with the young people looking for houses, I think one show is called 'Property Virgins', and some are forced to become more realistic after seeing what's on the market for the amount they want to spend. A few seem really spoiled and sometimes they even break down and cry from the stress.
If they've never done any renovations they probably don't have a clue about the time and mess involved either. Sometimes I wonder if they've taken into account the cost of taxes and upkeep as well as the cost of equipment like lawn mowers, ladders, etc if they've never had a home before.
posted on May 17, 2007 04:37:34 PM new
Same thing happened to me. I ran a load of towels with just TSP and a bunch of suds came out of the towels. Stayed in the washer FOREVER. Thought I'd NEVER get rid of that excess detergent.
Try running a load or two with no detergent at all. At least that way you're not wasting the water!
posted on May 17, 2007 04:51:06 PM new
Kiara, you hit the nail on the head. White with white is always in style. I can't think of a particular era of kitchen that wouldn't work well with white. The red and yellow is spot on for the '40s. A more modern kitchen would be nice with taupe (I call it paper bag brown) or even a deep sage green.
I watch the house buying shows too. Amazes me when the buyers expect they will have it all in their very first home. Especially since they are generally on a really low budget. In that position (speaking from a former Realtor's point of view) you take what you can afford, in a good location, and live with it until you can get it fixed up.
Renovation? Don't get me started!!! I've been at it since 2000 and I finally feel like my nose is at the top of the wall. This week's project is 150' of new fence along one side. Hmmmm... Never ends.
Years and years ago when I owned a GE washer I had the same problem. Repairman said it was because GE washers had such great agitation that with high sudsing detergent it did as you described.
Solution was to change detergents or get a new washing machine that didn't have such an active agitator.
