HOUSEWIFE'S NEEDS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22983, 10 March 1938, Page 5

HOUSEWIFE'S NEEDS

TRENDS IN THE HOME LABOUR-SAVING DEVICES LATEST COOKING APPLIANCES |"FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT] LONDON, Feb. It) British manufacturers appear to have realised very definitely that the housewife is a person whose wishes are worth studying. The most striking feature of the Birmingham portion of this year's British Industries Fair, which houses the hardware, engineering and metr.l sections, is the attention that has been paid to new facilities for the home and the improvement of old ones. And the field is infinitely varied, ranging from an air-raid shelter for the back garden down to a new kind of mo use-t rap. Cooking appliances find a prominent place and the trend to bright colours is even more apparent than in the past. Makers of gas and electrical goods vie with each other in producing cooking units that are at once rapid and efficient in operation. There is a gas heater which gives boiling water for tea in ."50 seconds, and an electric grill which cooks a sausage in 1 minute 30 seconds, and a steak in four minutes. A new attachment to electric stoves makes it possible for the housewife to go out with the knowledge that the oven will switch itself on at the right time to get the evening meal ready. Clothes Drying Machine The problem of what to do with the clothes 011 a wet washing day is entirely eliminated by means of a cabinet which makes the weather a matter of 110 concern. It is a portable, electric-ally-heated cabinet, large enough to dry and air the average weekly wash. The power bill for six hours' continuous use is Id. Another electric cabinet does in a modified way in an ordinary home what elaborate air-conditioning plants do in shops and hotels. It contains refrigerating, heating, filtering, humidifying and air circulating apparatus, which keeps the atmosphere in a room clean and at the right temperature in summer or winter. Fireside Furnishings Builders are providing in increasing degree the internal equipment of houses, in the form of built-in cupboards an;l wardrobes, with consequent reduction in the amount of furniture required. Even the goldfish bowl lias been taken from the occasional table, and built into the mantelpiece in several models displayed at the fair. Some of these mantel aquaria contain exotic species of fish from the South Seas, and, lit from

behind, provide a novol and fascinating fireplace decoration. Tho decorative and highly-burnished hearth furniture of a few yenrs ago has givon way to pokers, tongs and fireguards in restrained and often severely simple designs. Spun glass has made further developments, and this year cushions fiHed with it are shown at the fair. The soft, springy material in them looks and' feels far more like kapok than o-hiss. It is also available in textile fabrics, clothes and tapes, chiefly used for wrapping round domestic and industrial boilers for heat insulation and for sound deadening. The glass dress, the makers say, is still a curiosity, and rs not yet a commercial proposition. £2OO Air Raid Shelter The domestc air raid shelter for the garden is a very definite sign of the times. Claimed to bo bomb and gasproof. it costs about £'2oo. It is a steel chamber lined with i> new wall board made from asbestos nnd diatomaceous earth (fossil remains of plants). The peculiar function of tho new material is that i i absorbs rnoisti re and stale air breathed out b.v the occupants of the chamber, so that the atmosphere inside remains sweet for many hours, if the room is hermetically sealed. On everv side the trend is toward more ;and better labour-saving devices and to designs which will leave more space in the small-sized house of to-day. It is evident throughout tho fair that manufacturers have decided that it pays to consider the housewife.