Hot heating: ThermoStack heating system by Adriano Design.

Stereo music systems in the 1980s and 90s were often composed of a stack of individual components such as an amplifier, a radio tuner, a record deck and ...a tape deck. Each component was housed in a box around 400mm x 300mm x 60mm. The individual boxes were tethered to the amplifier and usually stacked on top of it. Remote from the stack were a pair of speakers that were sized in direct proportion to the size of the owner's ego. The idea was that if you wanted to add more functionality to your system, such as a reel to reel tape player, and later a CD player, you could simply plug-in another component to the stack. Yes, I know this sounds bizarre in the age of the smartphone where all this functionality resides in a couple of apps, but I promise you it is true!

Well the same idea has been revived in this heating system designed by Adriano Design.

The idea is simple. There is a central heating component, lets call it a “pot bellied” stove, that is equivalent to an amplifier. It produces heat rather than sound. Then there are heat emitters, remote from the stove, analogous to the loud speakers. If you wanted more sound in the HiFi system, and your amp was up to it, you simply got bigger speakers. Similarly if you want more heat you add another emitter onto the stack.

Sceptics might say that the idea is equivalent to an ordinary boiler and radiators, and they would be right, but this system has an aesthetic quality, an architecture that has actually been considered, and that has no need to be hidden because it is so ugly.

Perhaps the next stage is to produce a marshmallow toaster that sits on the stove, so we truly understand that apps cannot do everything.

The product won the 2013 ISH Design Plus Award at the ISH Frankfurt water and energy trade fair.