The reason your wife wants a shiny new piece of hardware on the foredeck is probably because you yourself are not shiny enough. Have you considered having your teeth chrome-plated?
But seriously....
What kind of boat do you have? What size? unless it has one of those chain lockers where half the foredeck is a hatch that opens over a shallow sort of box, rather than a conventional dark hole in the forepeak with a chainpipe leading down, the difficulties in having a windlass below seem insurmountable. How would you have a fair lead for the chain? How would you be able to monitor both the windlass and what was going on outside at once?
I saw a boat once where they led the chain from the bow roller to a small manual windlass (the sort that works with a standard winch handle) on the side of the mast, from where the chain went down into the cabin to keep the weight centered. It certainly removed a lot of foredeck clutter, since they unshackled the chain each time and stored it below, and put the anchor elsewhere as well.
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