Even if you consider yourself creative, your mind's eye probably has to squint to picture how this adjustable-height island hood:

fits in with this:

Stephanie Erickson photo

That's the concept behind incorporating a Miele Gallery -- the first in the nation -- in our Warners' Stellian Edina showroom. Miele (rhymes with Sheila) is a German manufacturer of high-quality residential appliances and vacuum cleaners that's been available in the U.S. for 25 years now.

The Gallery is basically a mini Miele Showroom within our store. Nearly 30 Miele appliances for cooking, cooling and cleaning are displayed in a minimalistic environment free of distraction and clutter. Translation: You can more easily imagine them in your own kitchen.

Which is a godsend for designers, architects, and builders, who can bring their clients to actually experience the product. The kitchen has more than a dozen live appliances to play around with.

Recent Miele customers can learn all the innovative and time-saving features of their new kitchen in cooking classes held in the fully functioning kitchen. Plus, you get to sip a really good cup of coffee while sampling the gourmet meals they whip up.

With the launch of our Miele Gallery, we currently are the only Minnesota retailer of Miele Professional Products. The dishwasher, washer and dryer and rotary iron boast faster wash times and bigger load capacities.

How much faster? You can wash a load of glassware while you're entertaining, and it'll be ready in 10 minutes. That's unheard of. The washer and dryer are designed to handle challenges like horse blankets, whose hair would clog up a normal machine.

More views from the Gallery:

 
Stephanie Erickson photos

The kitchen can become become a second play room with curious children running around. Thankfully, appliance-makers smartly designed features to prevent accidents before you even have a chance to worry about them.

Cool-to-the-touch cooking
Induction cooktops heat only pans, not hands. Because induction cooktops only react to ferrous iron, little helper cooks won't burn themselves on the element. You can even pull the pan off the cooking surface and touch your palm to it safely.

And because of induction's high-efficiency and rapid heat capabilities, models are being sold by LG, Electrolux, Wolf, Thermador and more. GE also makes a freestanding range with all-induction burners.

Prescription for safety
Refrigerated prescription drugs could end up next to juice boxes and snacks, which could confuse or tempt your children. 

This Electrolux French-door refrigerator has a twist-to-open utility bin at the top of the right door to keep medication separate from the rest of your food and out of easy reach.

Under(counter) lock and key
Wine and beer don't have to be out of reach to be out of kids' hands. Undercounter wine coolers and beverage centers keep your alcoholic drinks at the optimal temperature while door locks keep kids and teens out.

Models with door locks are available at the entry-level, like Avanti's beverage center to high-end, with Marvel's wine cooler.

Hands-free food disposer Batch-feed food disposers, like the Insinkerator Evolution Control Cover, operate only when the cover is on. So, the only things ground are chicken fingers, not kids' fingers.

One-button dinner
For busy families, options to save favorite cooking settings can be a godsend at dinnertime. Make-ahead meals make sense when you can enter in the cooking temperature, time and setting and save it to favorites.

For example, after school, older children can pop in a casserole from the fridge and choose the "Casserole" favorite (or "hot dish" if you speak Minnesotan) so the food bakes at 400 degrees for 30 minutes and dinner is ready by the time you get home from work.

Better yet, the Miele MasterChef wall oven comes programmed with settings for common foods like pizza and French fries that dummy-proof the process by helping you select the perfect settings, which can also be saved to favorites.

Favorite options are also found in Electrolux freestanding ranges and Electrolux wall ovens.

No power play
GE includes a control lock on some of its gas cooktops that shuts off gas to prevent it from being turned-on accidentally. When locked, the cooktop will sound if any control knob is set to any position other than "OFF."

You may have toured the Remodelers Showcase last weekend and a few Parade of Homes houses along the way. But a home designed by an architect is a "product of a different process."

What's that? You don't understand what that means, product of a different process? Why, we'll show you, then!

Coincidentally, the Homes by Architects Tour happens this Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 19-20 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Click to enlarge image. Photos courtesy HomesByArchitects.org

From the tour guide (available in PDF format):

This tour has 20 homes that cover a wide variety of architectural styles, designed for each client. You will see simple to avant-garde and modest to generous budgets; a cross-section of lifestyles from lakeside to city loft to farmhouses; and functional design decisions in material and citing meant to make the most of materials and land.

Warners' Stellian enthusiastically sponsors the Homes by Architects Tour and is proud to have supplied appliances in some breathtakingly designed homes.

Again, we're biased, but at least we're honest. If you only have time for a half-dozen, here's the six you can't miss:

ALTUS Architecture + Design, #2

CITYDESKSTUDIO, INC., #3

SALA Architects, Inc., #8 and #18

Domain Architecture & Design, Inc., #9 & #11

Acacia Architects, #14

David Heide Design Studio, #16

Tickets are $10 for a single home or $30 for all 20 homes, payable by cash only. If you purchase tickets online by Sept. 18, you save $5 off the $30 pass. Otherwise you can purchase tickets at any Twin Cities Originals restaurant.

 

Whether you're looking for a new home or just ideas for your existing home, you should check out the Parade of Homes Fall Showcase. The tour offers arguable the best way to truly experience the latest designs and get a feel for what builder or remodeler would work best for you.

Photo courtesy Mark Anthony Homes, #280

The showcase of the best new homes began Friday, Sept. 11 -- in conjuction with the three-day Remodelers Showcase -- and runs through Oct. 4.

You'll need all that time, too. There are more than 300 featured homes this year.

But don't feel overwhelmed. The homes have been organized by lifestyle category -- Condo Life, Earth-Friendly, Family-Friendly, Vacation Living, etc -- which are searchable on the Parade of Homes Web site.

Need something soon? Check out the results for Move-In Now for homes available today. Search results also can be filtered by location, price, number of bedrooms, house style, etc.

Photo courtesy Mark Anthony Homes, #280

Warners' Stellian supplied appliances in tons of these gorgeous homes, so we can't help but feel a bit of pride in those projects. Check them out!

Shadow Stone: #15

Cress View Estates: #21

Countryside: #59

Edina Galleria Residences: #70 (3 units)

Stonefield: #88

Smuckler Custom Builders, Inc. #124

St. Andrews Village: #216

Heritage Ponds: #246

Forest Hills Farm: #249

Hawthorne Heights: #250

Tapestry at Charlotte’s Grove: #270

Whistling Valley: #271

Mark Anthony Homes: #280

Dancing Waters: #287

Stonemill Farms: #293 & #294

John Kraemer & Sons, Inc.: #321

Wentworth Estates: #324

 

In your kitchen, that is. You've lived with a cramped, tired-looking kitchen for years. You need a better gathering place for your family. You wish you had the room to entertain friends without them being in your way.

You don't have to go it alone.

New Spaces, a design/build remodeling firm, is holding an interactive kitchen workshop at our Edina store (across from the Galleria) Thursday, Sept. 17 from 6:30-8:30 p.m. You'll actually draw your kitchen and then work with design principles on specific solutions and possibilities for your home.

Participants get real ideas for their homes, provided with no-pressure help by professional designers.

Photo courtesy New Spaces

On-hand designers will help you:

• Evaluate current kitchen
• Review kitchen design principles
• Review kitchen trends
• Draw existing kitchen
• Review potential design principle solutions to current kitchen

This is not a sales presentation. The workshop is designed to help you make wise remodeling decisions. If you can't make it Thursday, check out some of New Spaces' other workshops and webinars.

Space is limited, so register online or call (952)898-5300 for more information.