Jessica’s House

Jessica finally got a Kachelofen of her own in 2021 as a part of a major renovation. The Kachelofen itself is “stacked.” This means that the oven passes through the ceiling and continues on into the room above, in this case with a change of design (the short red Kacheln are an extension of the off-white slip trailed Kacheln). She chose a subtle “white on white” design for the main floor of her house. One of the Kachel has a personalized inscription. The upper portion of the oven is a brilliant ruby red with accent tiles. The pattern for the red accent tiles was inspired by carved stone rosettes around the fireplace of a heritage building located at the Vaughan Estate at the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto.

The rich cobalt blue glaze of the cookstove was influenced by a beautiful antique enamelled metal German street sign. Minervastrasse (Minerva Street) was named after the Roman goddess of wisdom, justice, law and victory. Perhaps more fittingly she was also the sponsor of arts, trade and strategy.

The cookstove and the Kachelofen can be fired separately or at the same time. The gases from the cookstove enter the Kachelofen’s first shaft via a damper. Each fire chamber has it’s own cold air intake, but share a single chimney. The chimney can be seen exiting the left hand side of the ruby red upper portion of the Kachelofen.