If you're less than enthused about your outdated fridge, here's one way to deal with it: cover it in photos and paint the handle!

Who: Fisher & Paykel
What We Noticed: What does the future hold for our kitchens? I, for one, hope the future includes a better refrigerator. Forget the jetpack; I want a fridge that doesn't take up an entire wall of my kitchen, freezes the lettuce, and costs an arm and leg too. When I talked with Thomas Johansson of Electrolux about the future of the kitchen last fall, the fridge was what he promptly focused on. And here's one way that new fridge could work out: Fridge drawers. 

I've had appliances on my mind, as you know, having recently bought an entire set appliances for my kitchen. Yesterday I shared some of my chat with Thomas Johansson, the Design Director of Electrolux, who talked about how he thinks that the refrigerator is the appliance that needs the most rethinking. Well, take a look at this idea from one of the 2012 Design Lab finalists: is this the fridge of the future? 

Shopping for kitchen appliances, as I shared last week, is an overwhelming and challenging process, full of moments that made me question the very shape and form of the appliances I was buying. Have you ever looked at your refrigerator or stove and wondered, Why does it have to be shaped like this? Why can't it be smaller? Bigger? Better-looking? As technology advances, how much of our basic appliances' forms will stay the same, and what needs to change? 

I chatted with Thomas Johansson, the Design Director at Electrolux and a judge at last fall's Electrolux Design Lab competition, and asked him what he saw in the future of our appliances. Read on for his thoughts, especially on the one appliance in the kitchen that really needs a makeover! 

Last we checked in with my kitchen renovation, we were wrestling IKEA cabinets and installing them with (ahem) sex bolts. (See all the posts about my kitchen renovation so far here.) Now I'd like to take a step back and talk about a process that should be sexy but is actually fraught with confusion, uncertainty, and a lack of resources: Buying kitchen appliances.

Read on to see how we navigated the overwhelming process of buying appliances, and to see what we picked out. I'll talk about how buying a range top can actually save you money, as well as our one amazing Craigslist find!

Last week I attended the 2013 Architectural Digest Home Design Show, which is a small trade show featuring a carefully curated selection of home and kitchen brands. It's a fun show to go to for that reason, since you know you'll only see the best of the best. Here are 5 brands that caught my eye:

Whenever we see a Smeg refrigerator in a kitchen, we're smitten. Maybe it's the vintage style, the rounded edges and long, horizontal handles. Or maybe it's the color—pale pink, baby blue, minty green, bright orange and red. So fun, so irresistible! Just makes us want to sidle up alongside it and listen to it hum. Tall, good-looking, AND it takes care of our food? Dream. More

This may be the easiest and quickest way to spook up your kitchen for Halloween: turn your refrigerator into a ghost!

Jean from Jean's Crafty Corner came up with this idea. All you need are two large sheets of black foam and a couple circle magnets. Draw out a desired shape, cut, stick on magnets, and voila! A little Halloween fun for your fridge. More

Have you solved the mystery of the humidity drawer in your fridge? If you're like me you probably just bump the notches towards the middle as a safety precaution. You may also put things into them haphazardly: all greens in one drawer, colorful things in the other. Sounds good enough, right? Well, last week, after seeing carrots and cucumbers not survive their time in these cryogenic chambers, I figured I had to look into how to use them properly... for the veggies' sake! More

What's in your freezer? Wait — you don't know? Is there a package of pie crust hidden underneath the bags of frozen dumplings? Or a mystery jar of meat sauce lurking in a back corner? If your freezer resembles a dark and mysterious junk shop, then take inspiration from these five enviably well-organized freezers. Clean, labeled, and dang-well organized! More