The enduring appeal of the Aga

A cooker is not just for cooking. That is the starting point to understanding the Aga.

It is impractical, environmentally unfriendly, and expensive. Everyone – including the Aga’s most ardent devotees – knows that. And yet the Aga cooker next year will celebrate its centenary. Despite all the modern appliances that should long ago have rendered it obsolete, these enamel-coated cast-iron behemoths continue to soldier on indefatigably. They are one of the twenty first century’s great survivors.

The brand has a glorious history. The Aga cooker was invented by a Nobel Prize-winning Swedish physicist. Having been blinded by an explosion from an earlier invention that went awry, he decided to turn his attention to designing something to help his wife in her daily toil. In later years, Douglas Scott, best known for his work on London’s classic Routemaster bus, worked on a tweaked Aga design. But no-one had more of an influence on the brand’s success than a young sales executive who in 1935 wrote ‘The