If you want a red or pastel blue dishwasher, you don’t have a ton of options, as most manufacturers’ appliances come in stainless steel, white, or black. Occasionally you can find one in gray, but that’s about as crazy as things get. Smeg has a line of ’50s Retro Style appliances that include fridges and smaller appliances, such as toasters and blenders. They definitely lend a unique feel to kitchens, without having to actually use devices that were made decades ago.
The company’s $1,999 FAB28 ’50s Retro Style refrigerator crops up in many a kitchens on Houzz, but at 9.22 cubic feet of capacity, it’s definitely smaller than many U.S. homeowners are used to. “It wasn’t big enough to be a primary refrigerator for most people,” Smeg’s marketing coordinator, Christian Boscherini, says. At the Kitchen and Bath Industry Show, Smeg had its larger FAB32 ’50s-Style bottom freezer refrigerator on display, which is now available for purchase in the U.S. for $2,999. The fridge alone has 8.2 cubic feet of space, and the separate freezer has 3.5 cubic feet. It has two adjustable thermostats and comes in black, red, white, pink, pastel blue, cream, orange, and pastel green.
When it comes out later this year, Smeg’s new retro dishwasher will likely match many of those colors. Inside it has a stainless steel interior and gray racks and spinning spray arm, but the plastic red accents and cutlery basket add a splash of color. The pricing and release are still to be determined, but it should be around the $1,500 mark. Boscherini says the retro dishwasher should be energy and water efficient, like Smeg’s other Energy Star-rated models, so you get the ’50s style without the energy suck.
