8 tips guide to buying a tea kettle

Looking for a teapot in the Prairie School Style? Good luck. I was looking to buy my girlfriend a teapot for her birthday. She lives in Oak Park the Prairie School center, and she likes that style. I looked high and low for a teapot that is sorta like a Frank Lloyd Wright style. Or even in a bauhaus style.

Along the way I learned some lessons about teapots.

1) There are tea pots and there are tea kettles
You do not put tea pots on the stove top. You put tea kettles on the stove top to heat up the water, and then you pour the water into a tea pot to brew the tea. Who knew?!

From here on out in this post, I will call it tea kettle, because that's what I was really looking for. Something to heat water on the stovetop.

2) The best tea kettles don't have a seam on the bottom
The stainless steel tea kettles that have the wall perpendicular to base are bad. Those involve having a seam. The seam will rust or be hard to clean. The best tea kettles have a rounded curve where the wall meets the base.

3) Enamel tea kettles are better than raw stainless steel
According to many tea kettle reviewers on Amazon, stainless steel might rust. (Which blows my mind, cuz I thought stainless steel didn't rust). Enamel is better. But then, some reviews for enamel tea kettles said the enamel might flake off. I like the look of stainless steel better, so I went with that.

4) There are no Frank Lloyd Wright style tea kettles
They simply do not exist. Please, find one and prove me wrong.

5) Higher handles are good
Some handles on tea kettles get too hot and you have to use an oven mitt to hold the handle. That's dumb.

6) Low plastic handles are bad
You don't want the plastic to melt. That would be bad

7) Plastic covers on the blower-whistle part are bad
That can melt. And that would be bad.

8) Low heat tea kettles are a waste of time
Some tea kettles say that you have to put your tea kettle on a low flame. What? No. I want my water to boil and boil fast!

Ok, so to show how much research I did into both the form and the function of the tea kettle, here are the google searches I did over the course of five hours of research:

Christopher Dresser teapot
Danish Soholm Atelier Teapot
danish Teapot
do i put ceramic teapots on the stove?
frank lloyd wright tea
frank lloyd wright tea pot
frank lloyd wright tea pot -guggenheim
general electric tea kettle
globo teapot
Marianne Brandt tea
modern teapot
naoko teapot
Naum Slutzky tea
Naum Slutzky teapot
Object Creative - Tea
Otto Lindig
Otto Lindig teapot
russel wright teapot
russell wright teapot
Scandinavian teapot
soho teapot
Soholm Atelier Teapot
sorapot
Stelton Potter Tea Pot
Storia Teapot
Storia Teapot, Herman Kahler
tea kettle
tea kettle amazon
teapot design
teapot hello-tiger
toast indian teapot
walter gropius
walter gropius tea

Here's some nice tea kettles on my Modern Tea Kettles pinterest board. Do you have a tea kettle? If so, what type do you have?