The latest luxury home trend: Feeding stations for pets built into your kitchen island

Joanna Hopkins of Slifer Smith & Frampton Real Estate was asked this week to zero in on the hottest trend she saw at last week’s Luxury Summit for Leading RE in Las Vegas (think Vegas ski show for high-end homes) and she didn’t hesitate for long:

“Pet feeding stations are the hottest new trend in interiors, which I thought was actually great for all of us who love our pets and want a nice, clean feeding station,” Hopkins said of the Vail area’s borderline obsession with canine comfort. “I thought that was actually the most interesting interiors takeaway, which is kind of funny.

“They build it into the island. It’s like they have a pot filler for the water, and then they have the food bowls, and they’re dog height and adjustable. And they’re all finished out in the same countertop materials.”

So Fido can feast from bowls encased in easily-cleaned stone, stainless, quartz or marble finishes in a dedicated space in the kitchen island, which has just gotten larger and larger over the years, with room now for multiple dishwashers, wine fridges and now a pet filling station for feeding and watering man’s and woman’s best friends.

Pampered pups now enjoy their own food storage, feeding and watering area in what’s being described as hygienic harmony with human culinary pursuits. 

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Hopkins explained that the Vegas show was focused, as its name suggests, solely on the luxury market, which in the Vail areas means a price point of $5 million and up. Other trends she saw are just newer, better takes on tried-and-true amenities like outdoor kitchens, so the humans can head out with their pooches to cook in and amongst the backyard shrubbery.

“Outdoor kitchens, they’re just refining the materials for them; they have wood-looking materials now, so they’re more durable for the outdoors, and they look a lot more polished,” Hopkins said. “They’re not just stainless steel, which is hard to keep up without it being covered. So outdoor kitchens are not going away for sure, but they’re a little more built-in and maybe have a little more design to them.”

This winter at least, an outdoor kitchen could have been used year-round even in what are typically the frostiest months at 7,000 or 8,000 feet in elevation. Even more so with the hottest new outdoor heaters that are available.

“Those outdoor heaters have gotten really efficient now,” Hopkins said. “And then you would just wall mount it close. You just don’t want it to be too far up in the roof or your overhang, because then the heat dissipates and doesn’t really hit you. They’re more like radiant heat.”

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Next year, no doubt, there will likely be built-in outdoor pet feeding stations complete with outdoor heaters for the hounds.