Brand Bible

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BRAND BIBLE186

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1 4

 of domestic appli-

ances in the booming postwar years can be seen in

the August 1948 issue of House & Garden maga-

zine, whose cover rather prosaically featured little

more than the interior drying rack of a Hotpoint

dishwasher. The accompanying feature story,

“The Vanishing American,” outlined the decline

of what had been an essential xture of every

upper to upper-middle class home for centuries:

the domestic servant. Replaced by a seemingly

endless parade of chromed and enameled appli-

ances for cooking, cleaning, and comfort, the maid

the evoLution

of Branding

appLianCes



use me



An old gas cooker (left)

and an antique stove

with bull-head motive

(right)





House & Garden

magazine cover,

August 1948

Sergej Razvodovskij/Shutterstock.com Reddogs/Shutterstock.com

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had become a relic of a bygone era, and by the latter

half of the twentieth century, she had disappeared

from all but the wealthiest of households.

This transformation in American domesticity

shifted the center of the home away from parlors

and dining rooms. Throughout the Victorian era,

kitchens had been seen as primarily o limits; a

strictly functional space relegated to the basement

or back of the house, to keep all practical and labor-

related activity away from guests and visitors.

But with the introduction of electricity and cook-

ing gas—and all the gadgets that utilize them—peo-

ple started seeing the kitchen as the mechanical

heart of the home rather than the origin of noise,

grease, and soot. The “electronic servants” that

replaced human labor were totems that symbol-

ized the rising auence of the boomer genera-

tion. The appliances transformed the kitchen

into a consumer showpiece for the new American

lifestyle. Walls that separated the kitchen were

removed, breakfast nooks added, and gleaming

Formica countertops installed to provide more

space for all the time-saving appliances eagerly

purchased by new homeowners. The kitchen began

to look less like a place of toil and drudgery and

more like a modern laboratory.



Few appliances have had as much an impact on

the quality, variety, and preservation of our food

than the modern refrigerator. Prior to mechani-

cal refrigeration, horse-drawn wagons delivered

ice to customers and the visits of the iceman were

as common as those of the postman. Zinc-lined

iceboxes held ice blocks in a top cabinet, allowing

the cold air to circulate down to the lower food

cabinet—a process that was only eective with the

frequent replacement of ice. Temperature consist-

ency was impossible. Drip trays needed empty-

ing often. With the invention of the refrigerator,

however, the ice industry withered and our rela-

tionship to fresh food was forever changed by the

availability of unlimited cold air.

A home refrigerator had been available from

General Electric as early as 1911, but it remained

little more than a modern marvel for many years

after. By the 1920s, brands like Kelvinator and

Frigidaire were beginning to mass-produce refrig-

erators, but their high price tag kept them out of

most American kitchens. The least expensive

model cost an exorbitant $300 at a time when a

Model T could be had for the same money. In 1927,

General Electric decided to lease its Monitor Top

refrigerator through utility companies for an extra

189



Print ad for General

Electric’s Monitor Top

Refrigerator, 1930





General Electric’s

Monitor Top Refrig-

erator, introduced in

1927

Use Me: The Evolution of Branding Appliances

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