First came the 14-place-setting dishwasher (1970), then the first semi-professional dishwasher, and then the first 6-star WELS rating appliance (2013). Now, Smeg has another first to add to the list, releasing the world’s most advanced dishwasher. Better still, here in Australia, we get to experience it ahead of the rest of the world.
The dishwasher’s new technology delivers the most intense water coverage of any dishwasher. An energy efficient single wash arm rotates through two axes, boosting the wash pattern density (meaning squeaky clean dishes) while using only 9.8 litres for a full wash. Add an all-white LED internal light and an extremely versatile flexi-dup cutlery tray and you’ll want to throw dinner parties all the time (I know I would).
The premium Diamond model is fully integrated featuring a sleek, hands-free, push-to-open door – the appliance is so quiet Smeg have built in a light designed to flash on the floor when it is in operation.
In addition to the five Diamond models in Smeg’s new dishwasher collection (which are all made in Italy), there are 16 wash models that offer a wide choice of features and programs, water and energy efficiency and wash tank size.
Features include Smart Dry, where the door opens at the end of the cycle to help drying and save energy; Active Acquastop to completely remove the risk of flooding by ensuring there is no build up of water pressure in the hoses when the appliance is not in use; and Quick fast programs including a fast wash of just 27 minutes. Smeg has also introduced its optional Safe Stemware glass racks that fit into the bottom basket of the dishwashers and securely hold both the glasses and the stems to remove the risk of chipping or breaking during the wash process.
These 15-place-setting gems are available nationally from leading appliance retailers.
Is anywhere more known for its coffee than Italy? Probably not! Having visited Milan, Venice, Tuscany and Rome last year, I can tell you it’s all true what they say! From city to city, Italians enjoy their coffee in different ways and with different traditions, but like the English do tea, they all take their hot beverages just as seriously!
In 2013, Nespresso celebrated this diversity through the cities of Naples and Trieste, with two unique and contrasting coffees. This month, they continue to pay homage to the rich heritage of Italy’s coffee culture with two new Limited Edition ristrettos, inspired by the emblematic cities of Milan and Palermo.
Last year, I visited Milan for the famous Salone del Mobile furniture fair and with so many huge halls to traipse around, a regular caffeine fix was high on my agenda! Remember though, no messing around with your coffee when you’re in Italy, Il Culto del Caffè is a serious business and you don’t want to get laughed out of the cafe! No cappuccinos or other milky coffees after breakfast, in many places expect to drink standing up, and as any purist knows, no flavoured syrups or any of that nonsense. Oh no, not in Italia!
Here in Australia, we’re lucky to benefit from the knowledge of our many Italian immigrants, whether it’s around coffee, fashion, style or food. I thought it would be fun to look at how you might take inspiration from Milan and Palermo in your interiors.
MILANO
Milan is Italy’s city of finance, business and fashion. Some would say it’s the global capital of fashion! My Milan-inspired interior would super sleek and high end but relaxed enough to be fashionable. Think elegant lines and great bones like timber floors, panelled walls and tall windows. It’s grand like the huge Milan Cathedral and the stunning Galleria shopping arcade and impressive like a da Vinci painting! But a little undone like a young, off duty supermodel!
Image via Fanuli Furniture. Click through for details
Tribute to Milano (Intensity 9) is Nespresso’s interpretation of the hustle and bustle of the vibrant city of Milan, where coffee is enjoyed at a fast pace, whilst standing at the bar. Inspired by the perfect balance of elegance and intensity at the architecturally impressive Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, Tribute to Milano is also a perfect equilibrium of elegance and intensity. A highly aromatic ristretto, Tribute to Milano transports you to a traditional gelateria in the heart of Milan with its fine fruity aromas and sweet cereal notes.
PALERMO
For all Milan’s sophistication and gloss, Sicily’s Palermo is altogether more relaxed and sunny, but just as bustling. My Palermo interior would be casual and colourful to reflect the city’s richness of culture, music and food. This interior is perfectly imperfect and a little rough around the edges. Raw materials and natural light feature heavily in this look. Furniture is mismatched in a charming way.
Image via Air Bnb. Click through for details.
Nespresso’s Tribute to Palermo (Intensity 11) is inspired by the relaxed and social coffee culture in Palermo and pays homage to the Sicilians’ love of a strong coffee. It is a powerful, intense and full-bodied ristretto with a silky texture reminiscent of a leisurely afternoon in the sun. Nespresso’s coffee experts were also inspired by the vibrancy of the Sicilian outdoor markets, alive with colourful spices, fresh produce and flowers so the cacao aromas and spicy peppery notes evoke an experience in amongst the locals at the market.
Image via booking.com. Click through for details
COMPETITION
To celebrate the launches, we’re running a competition over on Instagram. To enter, you’ll need to style and take a photo of your own tribute to Milan or Palermo and hashtag it either #tributetomilano or #tributetopalermo and tag us and @nespresso.
One winner will receive the new Nespresso Pixie Clips machine and a 10-sleeve Limited Edition Italian Inspired Assortment Pack, with additional accessories. Enter by midnight on 30 September 2015.
In this job, you get pretty good at spotting what’s going to be popular and I’m convinced these new Smeg small appliances are going to FLY off the shelves. I was lucky enough to attend the launch of these in Milan last year and have been waiting (im)patiently for them to land in Australia. Last week, Olivia attended a glamorous launch in Sydney and ever since we shared pictures on Instagram, our readers have been going mad for them!
Smeg say Italian design, award-winning style and enduring performance are the trademark features of the new collection of small appliances – the latest extension to the brand’s iconic FAB retro refrigerators. While we would all love a FAB fridge (I’ve been obsessing over the thought since I was a teenager and still don’t know which colour I’d choose but it WILL happen one day!), they aren’t the cheapest out there. Now, there’s an entry level Smeg option with a two-slice toaster ($179 to $199) through to the space age looking signature kitchen mixer at $799.
Designed in collaboration with Matteo Bazzicalupo and Raffaella Mangiarotti of Deep Design Studio, there’s also a kettle ($199) and a four-slice toaster ($199 to $219). Each retro style appliance pays homage to the Golden Age of the fifties while showcasing Smeg’s signature elegance and sophistication. Indeed, the aesthetics of the stand mixer and toaster have already received the GOOD DESIGN Award from the Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design plus the prestigious international iF Design Award for 2015.
There are up to seven colours — silver, black, red, panna and pastel blue across the range — plus pastel green and pink for the kettles and two-slice toaster.
And while style is always a standout feature of any Smeg appliance, it goes hand in hand with the brand’s commitment to the very latest technology and highest performance. The kitchen mixer, for example, sets new benchmarks in terms of power and versatility. Attributes include 800W high torque motor, 10-speed variable power and the all important soft start (no more splatters when starting at a high speed) and a planetary mixing action to ensure all areas of the bowl are reached. There is also a low-speed front attachment hub for optional attachments such as pasta roller and cutters. A blender, with a capacity of 1.7 litres, an 800W motor and four speeds will be added to the range later this year.
The Smeg kettle is feature rich with quiet-boil technology, soft-opening lid, cord-free swivel base and auto shut-off when the body is lifted from the base. It also has automatic switch-off at boiling point. A variable temperature model will be added to the range later this year.
Toasters include both a two and four-slice model with extra wide slots, reheat, defrost, cancel and bagel settings plus self-centring racks, six browning levels and removable stainless steel crumb tray.
Each of the small appliances features an enamel-coated stainless steel body and has been manufactured to the highest standards. Smeg provides a 12-month replacement warranty on all kettles and toasters, a three-month replacement warranty and five-year full manufacturer’s warranty on all kitchen mixers.
The complete range of Smeg small appliances is available from electrical and appliance retailers nationally from May. The range is already available at Myer.
As most of you know, my husband and I recently set off from Sydney on our six-month European adventure (don’t hate us). We just arrived in the Motherland (the UK) and it’s so good to be (second) home! I thought I’d share a few pix with you from the week we just spent in Tuscany and Rome, on our way here.
Our home in Tuscany
We spent the first four days in Tuscany, staying here. The accommodation was rustic but comfortable and in the middle of the very pretty countryside. No internet for four whole days, I tell you! Apart from the fact that running your own business means you always want to be able to check your email just in case the world has ended, the break from social media and connectivity was actually lovely. I read half a book, I took lots of baths and walks (mainly because there was only one English TV channel and you can only watch so much CNN) and really relaxed and switched off.
Market shopping for fresh produce
But most of the time we were learning to cook with the super charming Chef Claudio. I can now confidently make ravioli, gnocchi (two types), spaghetti with clams, focaccia, baked fish and so much more. These were all very simple, Tuscan recipes made with local, seasonal ingredients, which made them very straightforward and tasty. I left inspired! I’m not a very adventurous cook but now I can’t wait to expand my dinner party repertoire beyond something out of Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals! We also explored some gorgeous little towns with cobbled streets, visited markets and butchers and tasted the local Chianti.
The weather, as you can see, was perfectly springlike and around 21 degrees most days.
We then spent three nights in Rome and did all the usual tourist things. It’s a very impressive and iconic city, of course, but I can’t say I loved it. For me, it didn’t have the charm of Venice or Paris, but it was great to experience it nonetheless. Every travel experience is worthwhile if you ask me, and you’ll never love everywhere you visit. And that’s ok.
The Colosseum
No more travel for a couple of weeks now and a good chance to catch up on work (so far working remotely has been just fine) and spend some quality time with my family. Next trip is to the international furniture fair in Milan, thanks to Freedom Kitchens and Caesarstone. I’m sure I’ll have lots to share from there!
Launched a few months ago, Plyroom is a new online store featuring a collection of beautifully crafted ply furniture, designed and made in Italy. Melbourne woman Elise Heslop brought it here after a year out in Italy with her family taught her about small space living and multi-purpose pieces.
Following a philosophy of affordable, beautifully designed furniture, Plyroom’s products represent an appreciation for honest materials and smart design, hallmarks of Italy’s reputation as a major player in the design world. The products are both flexible in their many uses and suitable for a diversity of environments, such as home spaces, office spaces and more.
Whilst living in Europe, Elise came to appreciate the way things in a typical Italian home were looked after with a generational permanence. “This eye on taking care of things for the sake of passing them down to children’s children was quite a difference to the fast-moving nature of interior design in Australia,” she says.
Moving from a four-bed house in Australia to a two-bed apartment in Italy also taught her a thing or two: “As we got to know more people and spend time in their homes, I began to see how intelligently small spaces were being used throughout the entire home, from the bedroom to the living room – maximising functionality without compromising quality or adding clutter.”
She’s confident customers will love the versatility of the range, with drawers that can easily be shared between children’s and adult’s rooms (even offering the added flexibility of a change-table addition) side tables on hidden wheels, and beautiful curved ply seats with hidden storage.
Rotating drawers on hidden castors make for a flexible, space-saving storage solution
“As a furniture selection, Plyroom is really catering for customers who want flexible pieces that are easy to live with, designed with simplicity and optimism, and made with the highest quality materials. The Italian companies we represent are passionate about uniting traditional craftsmanship with modern technology. As such, their furniture embodies a more sustainable ideology built around made-to-last craftsmanship and combined with a design-rich aesthetic.”
Embracing an online retail model, Plyroom caters for both corporate and consumer customers, allowing visitors to browse online and select their pieces, which are then made to order in Italy and delivered Australia-wide.
“Much of the furniture is made from sustainably forested European Birch and flat packaged to reduce transport emissions. One of our designers in particular, who is passionate about sustainable design, has spent years working to design products with a unique joinery system that avoids metal parts entirely and are intuitive and enjoyable to assemble.”
Elise, who has a marketing background, founded the business nine months ago. Plyroom’s collaboration with prominent designers in Northern Italy brings a unique selection of furniture to Australia, inspired by flexibility and sustainability for every room in the home.
I realise this is a big ask. But just think of the fabulous design, interiors and architecture I could photograph and blog about for your viewing and reading pleasure! Plus, you might win a set of De’Longhi Icona Vintage kitchen appliances for yourself, and they are rather gorgeous.
Interessato?
This isn’t one of those crowdsourcing scenarios. I don’t want your cash, just your inspiration! And I’d love to source that via Instagram and Twitter. Here’s the deal: I recently partnered with De’Longhi on a fun event down at Moore Park Supacenta where we gave readers free fifties makeovers (so much fun!). Two other bloggers had their own events too. Now we get the chance to win a holiday for two to Italia. One in three odds aren’t bad! I would of course take the future husband with me. If possible, I would love the trip to coincide with the Milan Furniture Fair, where I have always wanted to go!
In addition to the five Diamond models in Smeg’s new dishwasher collection (which are all made in Italy), there are 16 wash models that offer a wide choice of features and programs, water and energy efficiency and wash tank size.
