If you’re interested send us a note at sammy at supernaturalagency dot com. Tell us a little bit about your project, where it stands, your design approach, budget range, etc. We’re looking forward to hearing from you!

*There’s a movement afoot to turn the word ‘dyson’ into a replacement for the word ‘cool’, as in Dyson (vacuum cleaner) sucks- opposite of which is doesn’t suck= cool. Whatever.

Step into the future with this kitchen designed by Poggenpohl and the Porsche design group.

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Visit: www.KitchenDesignInsights.com

Here’s how to do this design exercise (be forewarned, this a project but it will pay off!):

• Cupboard by cupboard and drawer by drawer, take everything out and lay it on a towel in front of the cabinet. You can do one cabinet at a time.
• Photograph the stuff laid out on the towel or counter. This will be useful later when you’re determining your storage requirements.
• Go through the stuff and separate out anything you have not used in the last 18 months (this saves those things you only use on once-a-year occasions like holidays). Set these things aside.
• Note the storage things that bug you- having to remove stacks of bowls to get a particular one, digging in the back for hard to reach items, heavy items down low that they painful require bending and lifting, etc. Keep notes. This is where you start to plan your ideal storage requirements like using big drawers for bowels, vertical tray cabinets for baking trays and cutting boards, hanging storage for pots and pans and utensils, etc.
• Do the same for food storage. Organize the dry goods you remove by type (starches like rice and pasta, herbs and spices, canned goods, baking materials, etc.). You’ll want to plan storage that consolidates these items in logical work groups. Then you can specify pantry cabinets for these groups, in locations where you work with them.
• Untangle junk drawers. Everyone has at least one and they are a functional part of any kitchen- a catch-all for odd items or rarely used tools and gadgets. Clean them out and look for patterns in what you actually use and what is simply stuffed in there ‘just in case you need it’.
• Think about cookbooks, knives, visibility, wines and liquors, small appliance storage, etc., and apply this approach to determining how you will store them.

This will be a full weekend project depending on how much stuff you have. The end result should be a wishlist of storage needs that your kitchen designer can use when specifying cabinets and locations for various items. It is also a great time to get rid of stuff that is no longer useful to you, old, out of date, etc. Throw out and donate now.

Finally, this inventory may alert you to things you’re going to want that you were not planning on. Getting a nice high end range? You can’t use those old Revere pans on a big flame- better budget for an upgrade. You may also discover that your lifestyle has changed, a critical thing to know when designing a new kitchen. Maybe you entertain more- or less, cook different foods, go out more, have kids or the kids are gone, etc. This is going to mean a different approach to your new kitchen, one that will help you get everything you need without breaking the budget.

Ordinarily, complicated looking cleaning gizmos are not my forte. So when Carol brought home this floor cleaning contraption, I was sceptical to put it mildly. However I took it out of the box and looked through the manual. Designed for cleaning hard surfaces like wood, tile and vinyl flooring, the Floor Mate looks like an upright vacuum cleaner with a difference: There are two clear tanks built into it. The idea is you fill the top tank with warm water and a measure of their floor cleaning solution. The bottom tanks is what makes this thing great.

The Hoover Floormate(tm) SpinScrub 500can be used as a vacuum if the tanks are empty and dry. I don’t recommend it as its really at its best as a replacement for mops, buckets, Swishers, etc. Here’s how it works: You give the floor a thorough sweep or vacumn. You load the Floor Mate up with the water/cleaner solution and set a big knob to the side to Wash. A set of brushes in the front start spinning and as you push it around you squeeze a trigger to squirt some of the cleaning solution on the floor. Working a 4×4′ area at a time you dampen it, then run the spinning brushes over it. Now comes the cool part. You switch the big knob to Wet Pickup and the brushes stop spinning and it starts sucking up the dirty water on the floor. You go back over the area you just did and it really does suck up the water into that lower tank. You move to the next area, switch back to Wash and repeat the process.
This thing works really great on hardwood floors. As a matter of fact I wouldn’t use anything else. Water is extremely damaging to wood floors and this vacuuming of the water takes it right up, virtually eliminating the possibility of damage. The floors are dry minutes after cleaning, another plus.
When you’re done, you pull out the lower tank and empty into the sink, rinse the parts and put back into the Floor Mate. It only takes a few minutes. This is where the experimenter in me came out. I measured how much of the water was returned to the tank compared to what was emptied out of the top. This thing picked up 90% of the water and it was very dirty. This means that, unlike mopping, you’re not only picking up the excess water, you’re getting virtually all of the dirt. The result is very clean floors with a nice sheen.
It also comes with a special tile set of brushes and a different cleaner for tile. It worked well but I used the same brushes and solution for both and saw no difference.
A big thumbs up for this device- I actually enjoy doing floors now (don’t tell that to Carol!).
A tip: If you have hardened-on stains or spills spray them with some household cleaner and let then soak a bit while you’re getting the gizmo loaded. They’ll come right up as you clean. Be sure you never use ammonia-based cleaners like Windex on hardwoods- they can stain oak floors black in minutes.
The Hoover Floor Mate has a suggested retail price of $169.95 and is available here:

Hoover Floormate(tm) SpinScrub 500