Just look at this romantic pair. A Smeg FAB28YB1 fridge, and a Smeg CVB20RNE freezer, paired together in holy kitchen matrimony! Have you ever seen anything more romantic? There’s huge amounts of space inside this twosome – the A++ rated fridge has 222 litres of space, and a 26 litre ice box, while the freezer has a whopping 170 litres of room. They are the ideal twosome for a large family to store their fresh and frozen weekly shop.

But, they’re not the only hot couple on Appliances Online...

Hotpoint’s Aqualtis washing machine and tumble dryer make a stunning pair when placed side by side. The washing machine is 30% more energy efficient than a standard A rated model, and the tumble dryer uses 40% less energy per year compared to a standard A rated dryer – so that means huge savings for you when it comes to paying the bills. More money to spend on presents for your loved one then!

A match made in cooking heaven – the Stoves Richmond1100DFT range cooker has found its perfect partner in the Stoves S1100DCP chimney cooker hood. These two make a lovely, traditional couple for a country-style kitchen, and with 3 ovens (including a slow cook oven), it’ll be no problem creating a delicious Valentine dish to woo your loved one.

Four might be a bit of a crowd on Valentine’s Day - but how good do these Baumatic dishwasher, cooker hood, induction hob and single oven look? Sleek and minimalistic, this range has 4 products with one distinctive style. That someone special will certainly be impressed with your kitchen design!

Whatever you’re up to today - single or attached – we hope you have a lovely Valentine’s Day!

Leading trend predictor Pantone has released its 2012 forecast, with bold blues standing out as a top colour for the new season. Blue is calming, fresh and revitalising. Perfect for keeping your home serene and your spirits up.

Their swatch of choice is Soladite Blue, “a classic maritime hue that brings order and calmness to mind, this dependable shade works with every colour in the palette.”  Our Smeg fridge freezer is a great match and is a fun product for any home. Its dark blue exterior is right on trend and will refresh a drab kitchen into a stylish and fashionable space.

This retro style fridge freezer could also be teamed with the mega Stoves Richmond Dual Fuel Range Cooker, which includes a huge fan oven capacity of 64 litres and is available in the same shade.

These products could be used as statement pieces or if you are feeling brave and super trendy you could use blue across the whole kitchen. Our built in appliances like this Baumatic Slimline Dishwasher and Baumatic Vented Tumble Dryer can be fitted inside your cupboards, to keep the continuity of colour throughout. 

Strong blues also team up really well bright whites, and in a smaller kitchen this will create the illusion of space.  Think of a beautiful Greek island; bring these refreshing colours into your home by adding splashes of lemon yellow to keep it vivid.

If your space is minimal try one bold product like this Freestanding Stoves Mini Dual Fuel Cooker with brilliant white walls. This will keep the room feeling airy and fresh, though it still tips a hat to the blue trend. You can tie the room together with smaller details to create an authentic nautical look.

Vibrant blues are naturally energising and will turn your kitchen into a stylish and exciting place to be. These products are made to be shown off, so embrace the trend and have some fun!

r  

Before I started at AOL, I was obsessed with the following: dresses, The X-Factor, pugs and fake tanning. Now things have changed.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m still the most orange girl in the office, but now, my hot topics of conversation include Samsung Eco Bubble technology, how cheap it is now to buy a pyrolytic lined oven and how my cooker hood grease filters aren’t changed nearly as often as they should be. That’s the thing with writing about, talking about and being surrounded by appliances all day. They suck you in, get you interested – sometimes even amaze you.

It is because of this new obsession that my latest blog post was born. Since my new-found fascination has developed, when I’m watching TV, I bristle with excitement if an appliance appears on screen. I pause and re-wind programmes until the brand name or distinguishing feature comes into view and I can identify with satisfaction the name and model number of the appliance on screen. I nearly fell off the sofa with excitement the other night when I realised that the bakers on The Great British Bake Off were using Neff SlideAway door ovens (I suspect the model was the B45E54N0GB).

And let’s not forget Sky 1’s new comedy drama, Mount Pleasant, starring Sally Lindsay, Daniel Ryan and a Hotpoint Quadrio. For me, this is exciting stuff.

So, in honour of my ‘appliance spotting’ hobby, let’s talk about the most famous appliances on the planet – the celebs of the appliance world.

Smeg is the Brad Pitt of appliances. Eternally good looking, and featured in a wide range of films from romantic comedies to thrillers, Brad is in demand in Hollywood. And so is Smeg.

Take Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Rosie Huntington-Whiteley’s character is the lucky owner of a Smeg stainless steel Fab28 fridge, and she’s not the only one. Ryan Reynolds, in switch-a-roo comedy The Change Up (released on the 16th of September), has a Red FAB28YR fridge in his bachelor pad, and in romantic comedy Something Borrowed Ginnifer Goodwin’s character chooses to chill her goods in, you guessed it, a Smeg FAB.

However, the ultimate owners of a FAB Smeg fridge have to be the cheese-loving icons that are Wallace and Gromit. Although the logo on their fridge reads ‘SMUG’, the unmistakable curves, creamy colour and silver handle all scream Smeg. Check out the FAB28QP for a similar version.

It’s not just the FAB range that’s taking over the large screen. In Mr.& Mrs Smith, Brad and Angelina’s kitchen is kitted out in Smeg appliances from what looks to be Smeg’s classic range. Their extra wide oven definitely resembles the Smeg SE995XT-7 (but our model even has an integrated Panini toaster!). Rumour has it that Brangelia were so impressed with Smeg that they furnished their £35 million south of France home with the brand.

Closer to home, Neff is a popular cooking choice. As well as starring in The Great British Bake Off, everyone’s favourite Italian chef Gino D’acampo uses Neff appliances on new daytime cooking show Let’s Do Lunch with Gino and Mel. The This Morning kitchen also boasts a Neff Series 5 C67M70N0GB compact microwave oven, as well as a cream Rangemaster American fridge freezer, and a matching range cooker (for something similar, check out the Stoves Richmond1100DFT range cooker in champagne).

So, the next time you’re watching a film and the hero fetches himself a cool beer, or enjoying a cooking programme and Nigella takes a delicious cake out of the oven, take a look at the brand of the appliance. It’s probably one that we sell here at Appliances Online. And spare some sympathy for those who are watching TV with me. They’re probably waiting patiently whilst I try to pause the screen in my attempt to fathom the colour, model number and features.

Glen Dimplex are best known for their appliance brands Newworld, Belling and Stoves, and for the quality British engineering they put into their products. In fact the Glen Dimplex family is the only manufacturer to build the majority of its products here in the UK. To find out exactly how Glen Dimplex create their Best of British appliances we visited their head office and manufacturing plant. And here’s what we found...

Showcasing the best and brightest that this family of brands had to offer, it was clear that the people at Glen Dimplex really love the hands on approach. Holding up to even the most technical questions we could think of, we felt a genuine sense of pride from the manufacturer - they really are appliance experts. They have a real passion for their British heritage, but from the shop floor to the sales room the main message was always that the customer comes first.

So after attempting to exhaust their product knowledge, we put in our earplugs and embarked on a tour of the factory to see, with our own eyes, this quality engineering and customer focus in practice.

The Glen Dimplex factory tour
This was the first time most of us had been into an appliance manufacturing factory and the amount of ingenuity exercised in the plant was overwhelming. My personal highlight was seeing the enamelling process from start to finish.

We were shown the secret ingredients that make up Glen Dimplex’s own special recipe for Pristine enamel. They let us see how it was pounded, mixed and sprayed onto the necessary components, then fired in the huge furnaces. The transformation is fantastic and seeing it first hand, from start to finish really is a privilege.

But here’s the most important thing we learned from Glen Dimplex...whether it’s a thousand pound range cooker or a value first time appliance, every cooking cavity and appliance they make uses exactly the same quality of high glass content enamel. It means that not only will it be more efficient at keeping the heat where it belongs, but it makes grease and dirt so much easier to clean off. Looks beautiful too!

It was on entering the product testing department that the pure commitment to quality really hit home. Having just seen the very same appliances assembled and checked moments before, we saw how Glen Dimplex randomly took appliances from the production line and tested them over a period of time to truly confirm their quality. It was wonderful to see the level of dedication and craftsmanship that went into making these appliances and I think it’s safe to say, we were all officially impressed!

The entire country is gearing up to celebrate the Royal Wedding and at Appliances Online we’re celebrating all the things that make our country great – from cricket to endless cups of tea.

But in the world of kitchen appliances the Great British brands are Stoves, Belling and Newworld.

These are the only major kitchen appliance brands still committed to UK manufacturing. They design and build their products here, paying incredible attention to detail and manufacturing some of the highest quality cooking appliances.

Between them, the companies employ over 1000 staff in the UK, including UK customer care centres, so the team is always on hand when you need them.

Because their design teams work from Britain, they understand what the British cook needs. That’s why you’ll never struggle to cook a family roast or full English breakfast on a Stoves, Belling or Newworld appliance.

So, which products should you choose for your British cookery?

• For your cooked breakfast choose an appliance with a griddle such as the Sterling900DFT range cooker, where your fried eggs and bacon sizzle and cook like a dream.
• For a roast, Stoves cookers like the Richmond1100GT range cooker include telescopic shelves, which make getting huge cuts of meat in and out incredibly simple.
• Conventional cookers are great for baking, but the Intensive Bake programme featured on models such as the SEB900MFS eliminates the need to bake pastry blind. It is suitable for cooking food with high moisture content, such as quiche, bread and cheesecake to the most sumptuous standard!
• For your street party the Belling BABY121R electric cooker is an absolutely perfect portable outdoor appliance which can be run from a 13Amp plug.
• And to keep Great Britain green, choose the FSE60i induction electric cooker. This innovative appliance is the only freestanding cooker to feature an induction hob. Induction cooking is a hot topic right now as it is nearly twice as fast as a gas hob, 30% more efficient and far easier to wipe clean. And with the FSE60i it’s available to you even if you’re not looking for a built in kitchen.

So, if you’re planning on baking for your Royal Wedding street party, or celebrating with a typically British roast, go British with Stoves, Belling or Newworld!