So that’s how Kate is going to iron Wills’ trousers!
From a fridge with NASA technology to a hands-free iron and taps you turn on with your feet, secrets of Kate’s super-bling new kitchen
YOU ARE either an aga lover or you are not. and the Duchess of Cambridge, it appears, is surprisingly not. So anyone imagining that the new kitchen at Kate and William’s country bolthole anmer hall, in Norfolk, would be a rural range-warmed Sloaney affair, would be wide of the mark.
There will be no wicker baskets, no snug dressers, no moth- eaten woollen rugs, no utilitarian wooden table and none of the comfortable, lived-in feel so beloved of the home Counties set.
Instead, Kate has decreed her new kitchen will be filled with american and Germanbuilt stainless steel units and appliances. So out with the cosy kitchen, in with the hightech, space-age affair, which tells the world just how modern and up-to-the minute this young, royal couple are.
It’s why William and Kate have ripped out the entire existing hand-built kitchen — all polished walnut and aga — because, despite its £38,000 price tag, it didn’t fit with their vision of what they wanted for the Georgian pile on the Sandringham estate.
Make no mistake, a new kitchen — especially if you have money — is a real litmus test of taste, class and ambition. a summary, all in one room, of a person’s aspirations.
So what does Kate and William’s sleek, modern affair — full of restaurant-standard equipment with the finest furnishings and underfloor heating beneath a reclaimed stone floor, as well as gleaming surfaces of Carrara marble and granite — say about them?
It certainly seems that with their state-ofthe-art tastes they are aligning themselves more with the rich brigade than the posh brigade. and, insiders say, they are paying for it all out of their own pocket.
The focal point of the room is said to be a dining table f or at l east eight people. Kate has taken advice from food writer Tom Parker Bowles (her mother-in-law Camilla’s son) who loves a large dinner party in a kitchen.
handily enough, he is also a promotional ‘ ambassador’ to Sub- Zero & Wolf, the american company that specialises in status- symbol £15,000 fridge freezers the size of double wardrobes.
Kate and William have already kitted out Kensington Palace with these products and are now said to be installing one of the giant fridge-freezers at anmer hall.
also used by Coleen Rooney, Victoria Beckham, Bernie ecclestone, Sir Paul McCartney, Madonna and Rod Stewart, these monolithic fridges come complete with an air-purification system invented by NASA that kills bacteria, automatic icemakers which make crescentshaped cubes (said to melt more slowly) and lights on every shelf so no forgotten food ever goes mouldy at the back.
a special salad drawer is kept a few degrees cooler to keep the royal rocket and radishes crisp.
The Cambridges have also i nvested in a £ 8,000 Wolf double-oven with (separately) five induction rings on a black ceramic hob, which boasts an ‘ eye- catching’ cobalt blue i nterior ( useful f or spotting burnt-on food), and ten different ‘ cooking modes’ which vary temperature and airflow at the touch of a button depending on whether Kate is baking a cake or cooking a roast.
It even has additional warming drawers — metal drawers which keep food at chosen temperatures, so she can keep starters warm while cooking the main course, or heat plates before her guests arrive.
Then there’s an extraordinary chrome sink called a Dornbracht eUnit also favoured by discerning football WAGS and jetsetters alike. Belfast sinks — found in Kate and William’s old doomed kitchen — are so passé after all.
But, at £4,000, you might not want to let a dirty dish near it. This integrated sink and drain-ingboard, with a professional hose-style tap to rinse out every corner, looks fairly ordinary at first glance. But i t boasts a number of high-tech touches. a tiny foot- sensor at floor level knows when someone is standing in front of it, and with the merest waggle of a foot, will turn on the spout — useful when hands are dirty after chopping meat or picking muddy veg so you don’t spread bacteria on to the taps.
It also has a discreet touchscreen button on the draining board which lets you set the water temperature (the company
recommends 30 degrees) and a drain that works when you tap the button so you don’t need to reach into mucky water to pull out the plug.
Best yet, you can set the amount of water that comes out of the tap so you never have t o use a measuring jug: for instance, set it to four litres and it will produce exactly that automatically before turning off.
On the downside, some customers have warned the unit can heat water to boiling point.
But it seems perfectionist Kate is set on having only the best of the best: a £149.99 Dualit four- slice toaster in silver (a favourite among Sloane friends) and a £420 Kitchen-Aid mixer (a Middleton stalwart) are all on the list.
A set of £159 restaurant-standard, hand-made Sabatier Perrier knives from France (this brand is one of the oldest knife- makers in the world) are included, too. And that is not to forget the quick-boil kettle, a £ 1,000 state- of- the- art coffee maker (at this price, it will be barrista-quality and able to make lattes, cappuccinos and flat whites at the touch of a button) and crystal and glass from William Yeoward. Here, champagne glasses are around £169 each, water glasses, £45.95 and a simple water jug £92.
Kate’s perfectionism also extends to the health of herself and her family, and, of course, her figure. The kitchen will feature a £100 silver ‘Nutribullet’ blender, the very latest juicer that keeps the goodness from the fibre in the drink.
This machine is perfect for Kate to whip up the kale, beetroot, linseed and ginger smoothies with sunflower seeds and acai powder she likes to consume (for two days a month, she eats only vegetables and fruit).
Next to the kitchen at Anmer there are laundry rooms and a mudand-boot room. In the laundry, housekeeper Antonella Fresolene, who normally works in Kensington Palace, will be on hand, it is said, to sort out the bed linen and linen cupboards. This is from the 150year- old Italian company Frette, which provides soft furnishings to top hotels and private residences from its 100 exclusive boutiques.
Kate is rumoured to like Lino nel Vento (lavender) and Acqua di Limone (lemon and lime) linen spray, from Jo Malone at £38 a tiny bottle.
The laundry room has a professional Blanca Press for sheets (an industrial-size press usually seen in hotels) and a Tubie Ironing Machine for trousers and shirts. This is a bizarre, hands-free German gadget that costs £850 and is said to be able to iron a shirt by itself in seven minutes. It comprises a mannequinlike plastic stand that you simply pop a wet shirt over and attach with clips, and then it heats up, drying it without any creases.
Prince George’s clothes are hand washed by his Nanny Maria, who will, of course, have her own kitchen in her separate accommodation.
The boot room might be Lupo’s domain, housing his collars — these are from Mungo and Maud, an upmarket pet shop near London’s Sloane Square — and leads alongside the wellies (Kate favours posh brand Le Chameau, which start at £80 and go up to nearly £400). There are also pegs for the Barbours and an umbrella stand.
FOOD writer Rose Prince says: ‘ Kate f aces the unusual predicament in that her country kitchen will often need to be used semi-professionally for large parties. So that’s why they will have gone for stainless steel, polished stone and lots of gadgetry.
‘No private chef likes to use an Aga — there’s not enough room on the hob or in the ovens; they have no grill and they can lose heat at a crucial moment. She’s sensibly going for modern, state-of-the-art cooking appliances.’
‘Kate’s choice of induction hob is again a professional choice. It’s quicker and better than bottled gas, which is often the only gas available in the country.’
Quite what the Queen might make of it all is another matter. It is hard, of course, to imagine the thrifty monarch being too thrilled by this lavish living. The old upper classes of England generally think it’s a defect of upbringing to care too much about something as banal as kitchen equipment.
Cultural commentator Peter York, however, believes the royal couple are creating a statement kitchen and there are important subliminal messages to be deduced here.
‘It says we are modern and have global taste rather than sentimental English country taste. I think it’s a good sign that they want to live in the kitchen themselves,’ he says. ‘All this Sub-Zero & Wolf stuff is global billionaire taste. I think you have a coming together of taste — modern rich people all lust after the same thing. And why not? Those tasteless WAGS have become more tasteful and the traditional types have become less traditional.
‘Kate and William have brought the values of the striving middleclasses into the Royal Family. They are catching up with the rest of us who don’t see a kitchen as a wretched monument from which to bring food to the dining room.
‘They are distancing themselves from the upper classes who are quite fond of frightful kitchens.’
Like many building works, the Anmer project has apparently overrun, which means that the talked-about summer party there has been delayed.
There is speculation that Kate is concerned about being so far away from her parents if she spends too much time in Norfolk.
But then again, once she’s finally moved i nto this showcase of modern efficiency and luxury, she might discover she doesn’t mind quite so much.