Wooden, I don’t assume I have to work too onerous to persuade you, is a reasonably superb substance. It grows out of the bottom after which turns into among the most necessary issues on the planet: pencils, baseball bats, clogs, porch swings, campfires, crucifixes, tall cabinets stuffed with books (that are additionally wooden, when you squint somewhat). Solomon’s temple was wooden; so was the Mayflower. So had been Kane’s Rosebud and Prince’s guitar. As constructing supplies go, wooden’s durability-to-weight ratio is principally unmatched, due to the lengthy, skinny, hardy cell construction that helps timber stand up to excessive climate situations.
Wooden does, nevertheless, have its limitations, and lots of of them are discovered within the kitchen. Processed wooden warps, so it must be dried instantly after hand-washing (neglect the dishwasher). Moisture, use, and the passage of time can flip its fibers brittle and uninteresting, so consultants suggest treating it repeatedly with oil. Clearly, it has been recognized to catch on hearth. And although wooden is of course antimicrobial, if it splinters, these cozy natural crevices are the forms of locations the place mildew, mildew, and micro organism love to hang around. There’s a motive most workhorse bowls in lots of kitchens are ceramic, steel, or plastic.
None of this appears to matter to the individuals who just lately purchased KitchenAid’s Artisan Design Collection Evergreen 5-Quart Tilt-Head Stand Mixer, which comes not with the model’s commonplace stainless-steel bowl, however with a walnut one. The machine appears to be like like one thing you may discover in a glassy, aseptic mid-century-modern condominium, possibly someplace Nordic. KitchenAid, for its half, believes that it “brings the fantastic thing about the forest house” and helps “makers” “really feel like they’re out within the woods experiencing all of the revitalizing parts.”
The bowl, as a result of it’s made out of wooden, is somewhat specific. “Merely hand-wash and dry instantly” begins a video tutorial that the model posted to YouTube, over peppy synths and a shot of an enviable copper-and-marble kitchen. Then the video reminds you to season the bowl repeatedly with walnut oil, food-safe mineral oil, and/or food-safe wooden polish. When requested, in a Q&A bit on the KitchenAid web site, about whipping egg whites, an organization rep warns, “It’s not beneficial to make use of the oiled wooden bowl for whipped egg creations.”
This finicky, egg-hostile machine retails for $699 earlier than tax, greater than double the value of the least costly KitchenAid stand mixer—despite the fact that it basically does what all of KitchenAid’s different stand mixers do: present a sturdy, stationary base and a strong motor for mixing dough and batter, hands-free. Paying a whole bunch of {dollars} extra for a software that’s additionally extra annoying could seem counterintuitive for individuals who prepare dinner primarily to remain alive. However in fact, the Evergreen isn’t for these individuals. With this latest launch, KitchenAid is acknowledging one thing that’s been true about its flagship product for years: The stand mixer doesn’t essentially have to be straightforward to make use of, as a result of it’s not solely meant for use. It’s additionally meant to be displayed.
In 1919, when KitchenAid first launched the stand mixer, cooking—baking particularly—was obligatory drudgery; the stand mixer promised to make it simpler. Lately, although KitchenAid sells all types of different doohickeys, the stand mixer continues to be what the corporate is understood for. When individuals say KitchenAid, they’re in all probability speaking in regards to the stand mixer, simply the best way Kleenex has change into synonymous with facial tissue.
What has modified over the previous century or so is the tradition of cooking. For many individuals, cooking is now usually leisure—one thing they do to chill out or exhibit, not simply because they should. The issues we use to do it are, commensurately, symbols: proof of a good looking life. KitchenAid is aware of this. As the corporate’s advertising director mentioned in 2007, “Analysis tells us that many much less avid cooks merely need one on their countertop, largely as a result of they like its design.” Certainly: “I NEED it,” one particular person wrote on X in regards to the Evergreen. Added one other, “I’d hit my nice grandmama within the ankle w a razor scooter 89 occasions for an opportunity to get my arms on this dangerous boy.”
In anthropology, fetishism refers back to the veneration of inanimate objects. Karl Marx borrowed the idea in coining the time period commodity fetishism—the concept that sure items, underneath sure situations, can “transcend sensuousness.” They’ll tackle worth other than and past their precise use or the labor required to supply them.
That’s one method to perceive the Evergreen. One other is thru the decline of the Prompt Pot, the electrical strain cooker that offered tens of millions of models earlier than its mother or father firm declared chapter final 12 months. A part of the issue, Amanda Mull wrote in The Atlantic, was that it labored too properly; everybody who wished one purchased one, after which there have been no extra individuals to purchase them.
KitchenAid is owned by the publicly traded equipment behemoth Whirlpool, which made about $19 billion in income final 12 months, nevertheless it’s not onerous to think about its executives worrying about the identical subject. Colours and supplies apart, the fundamental design of a KitchenAid mixer hasn’t modified a lot because the mid-Nineteen Thirties; the one I’ve in my kitchen isn’t all that totally different from the one Julia Youngster had in hers. It’s a easy product that does what it’s imagined to do—combine stuff—and is constructed to final. In a novelty-obsessed shopper tradition, that’s not an asset for an organization; it’s a legal responsibility.
There are two methods to unravel this downside. One is to get individuals who already personal stand mixers to purchase extra stand mixers. KitchenAid, and varied different legacy makers of high-quality home equipment, has just lately adopted the “drop” mannequin, which has helped the style business flip even low-quality clothes into collectors’ objects over the previous few many years. The strategy—launch limited-edition or specialty merchandise, typically in collaboration with beloved manufacturers—alchemizes synthetic shortage into consideration, and turns product releases into occasions. It additionally, crucially, encourages individuals to purchase new variations of issues they have already got. For this reason KitchenAid yearly releases mixers in limited-edition colours, and why, a few years in the past, the almost century-old French enamelware model Le Creuset made a Dutch oven that appears like Harry Potter: Folks purchase them.
The opposite method to promote extra stand mixers is to get extra individuals basically to purchase stand mixers—to rope in individuals who don’t want, or wouldn’t purchase, a $700 kitchen software within the first place. That is, to be clear, most individuals, even most individuals who bake. Except you might be repeatedly making bread or processing dense doughs, a $40 hand mixer will in all probability do the trick for brownies, cookies, and truffles.
However the KitchenAid mixer isn’t only a software—it’s an announcement, a talisman, a flex. Begin in search of it within the background of superstar house excursions and cooking reveals and also you received’t be capable of cease noticing it. It says I’m collectively sufficient to tackle formidable baking initiatives, and I can afford an costly equipment to assist me. In that method, it has much less in widespread with, say, a blender than with a totally totally different object: an engagement ring. Each are costly standing symbols typically acquired within the spring of 1’s life; each are of restricted use and enduring recognition; each are signifiers of home attainment; each are issues individuals excitedly submit to Instagram.
The Evergreen, in accordance with not less than one early overview, does certainly work to make brownies. And within the grand scheme of troublesome developments in meals tradition, an individual of means shopping for a fussy mixer that they don’t want isn’t that dangerous. However make no mistake in regards to the message the Evergreen is sending because it sits atop your gleaming counters: On this kitchen we might not make the meals, however we’re tremendous throwing down some huge cash to fake.