Should a microwave oven look like a microwave oven, and, if so, what exactly is that? My graciously appointed office pantry has a Sharp Half Pint, a smaller-than-average microwave, about the size of a bowling ball, that’s perfect for dorm rooms, small apartments, and office pantries. But the oven mechanism – the bright white box where we set our leftovers and stale coffee to be irradiated – is wrapped in curved plastic panels that are trying very hard to make the appliance look like more than just a microwave.
There’s a recurring joke on 30 Rock about Jack’s half-cooked marketing schemes for GE microwaves. (In one episode his team makes the case really big and puts four wheels, four doors, and a steering wheel on it.) There must have been similar brainstorming sessions at Sharp. The earliest Half Pints have a simple, rectangular white plastic case that echoes the inner box. Then, in 2000, Sharp released a series with curved translucent cases in rainbow hues, similar to the colored iMacs. Today the oven is only available in opaque black. Our office Half Pint is a pretty, see-through, cornflower blue. Each time I open it I have to wonder what a microwave oven was meant to look like, because I doubt that this is it. Unlike the iMac, with its freely curving case, the Half Pint case remains squished and cubish; it sticks close to the contours of the oven inside. It’s nice to be able to see through the front panel to the sleek metal box within. Perhaps Sharp can engineer a microwave with a clear, orthogonal case, unsoftened by curves and color. That would be honest and also, maybe, unappetizing.