American fridge or integrated fridge!

[greeceiwwhereimdreamingof]

I currently have an American fridge with water dispenser etc at the front and find it good but with our new kitchen im thinking we should maybe get an integrated fridge as we plan on having a bank of units with ovens etc built in - anyone any advise ? not sure where to start looking 0- are there integrated fridges that have cold water/ ice dispensers ? internally are they usually smaller?

We went from American to integrated and I hate it. It’s so much smaller, with no water / ice. The freezer is tiny too.
We were lucky enough to have a huge shed out back so we kept the American fridge and it’s still used all the time for the overflow. Very handy for Christmas as otherwise I don’t know what I’d do.

Thanks magicstar1 that was my concern- I'll think seriously about it!

neither - freestanding with a built in place for it. For example:

www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/household-appliances/refrigeration/fridges/liebherr-k2330-tall-fridge-white-09919594-pdt.html

this one has a design cockup with two smaller salad drawers (some art student who clearly never saw a cucumber) but apart from that is fine, and has much more internal space than an integrated one plus a lighter door. Even our incompetent kitchen designer managed to get the cabinet for it right - this lifts it to the correct height as you don't want to be bending to floor level when you want the milk.

water dispensers take up space. If the water isn't cold enough from your tap, fill a bottle and put it on the milk shelf.

I have had both and American a million times over. We were always playing tetris with the shopping with the integrated whereas with the american there's so much more space. Love having ice and cold water on tap too but i love my drinks cold

A matching pair of fridge and freezer at the end of a run of cupboards. Easy to replace and you can buy whatever size you need. Looks similar to an American one but it's better. Get a hot tap with a cool water function for your sink.

I went from a 50/50 integrated to an American and the difference is phenomenal. American every time. We still manage to pack the freezer bit full though so I'm considering getting an extra chest freezer.

AmericaN

I have integrated and hate it

We have an American and also a freezer in the garage (as we batch cook) as well as a wine fridge 🤣

The American fridge would have a cabinet built around it but the front would be on display!

American, 100%.

Going against the grain. I hate the look of american fridge freezers. They're so ugly & dominate the space. I think maybe if you have a kitchen shut off from the rest of the house, maybe, but we have a large kitchen / dining / living and it would have become the focal point and ruined the design we were going for.

We have a 60/40 integrated fridge freezer (family of 5) and its fine.

If you're an American fridge/freezer, make sure the capacity is not less than 600 Litres to get the full benefits.

We bought this one few months ago www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/household-appliances/refrigeration/fridge-freezers/samsung-rs8000-rs68n8240b1-eu-american-style-fridge-freezer-black-steel-10178887-pdt.html

It look small but the internal storage is huge. The left compartment is freezer and very very valuable to us as we don't need to bend down to get items from the freezer.

I still have my integrated fridge freezer but the idea of bending down to get freezer item is a pain

We have fully integrated as I like everything to be hidden away and can’t bear the idea of anything going underneath as how would you get to it? Also if something goes wrong either appliance can be replaced. If an American and the freezer broke, would you have to replace the complete unit? Ice kept in the freezer and chilled water in the full floor to ceiling integrated wine fridge 😳

We went for two free-standing units. The American fridge freezers might have a good capacity for the fridge, but much less so for the freezer, especially if they have an ice/water dispenser. So we bought a separate 60cm wide freezer that matched the separate 60cm fridge.

this fridge next to this freezer

I think it depends what you want to achieve and what other space you have.

When we redid our kitchen I opted for an integrated 60/40 fridge freezer as we have an L shaped room with the kitchen in s compact space and I didn't want to give space to an American one. But I also bought an American one for the garage.

Our kitchen fridge freezer has all the day-to-day stuff in it and the one in the garage has the batch cooking in the freezer plus additional fruit and veg, etc in the fridge. And wine

We love cold drinks so always have ice in the kitchen fridge freezer plus two 1.5 litre bottles of water in the fridge door.

If we didn't have a garage I might have been more tempted to have a larger American style fridge freezer in the kitchen but I prefer the streamlined look of having everything built in.

We have an American FF mainly because of the water and ice on tap. Every meal time we have iced water on the table and the teen sons also fill those water bottles with markers on every day from it. We can taste the difference between the filtered water and our tap water. We have had it 8 years.

We do have a larder freezer in the pantry though as I batch cook and we shop at Costco. I did want integrated but larder ones not a single FF unit. Dh won out on the ice and water dispenser and we have no regrets.

Separate full height free standing fridge and freezer here, looks good and loads of room (and somehow we still fill the 'spare' freezer in the garage) - mirror the door openings so it looks like an American and build your units around it.