Worth its weight in gold, or copper as the case maybe
Ensuring your Smart-Home stands the test of time
Crowning your home with the coveted title of ‘Smart-Home’ is a project that should not be undertaken lightly. It is definitely the sort of thing that you do the majority of work once, at the beginning, and then perhaps modify at your leisure. Future proofing is thus one of the core responsibilities of the custom designer, his/her job is to raise issues and provide suggestions when you decide on the specifications of the system. In terms of technology and future developments, this is undoubtedly the responsibility of the custom designer although there are other considerations that are just as important. Here are some things to get the synapses firing:
You the interior designer
Ensure that rooms are flexible so that you can move furniture and equipment around. Plug sockets may appear to be in strategically discrete positions initially but specify that you may want to move your furniture around or get new furniture, in which case you do not want long cables ruining the aesthetic of a space to cater for this new layout. A plug socket although objectively not much of an eyesore, for you it may seem as eye-catching as a bad-hair day.
“Knock before you come in!”
People’s interests and demands change all the time, this is certainly the case with children. One minute they need you to tie their shoe laces, the next minute they’ve managed to find the most obscure trainers on a Japanese website that they must have because ‘T’, the playground king, says that these trainers are even cooler than his older brother. As people’s rooms are a reflection of their character you may want to provide enough flexibility to cater for both the teenage-angst-death-metal phase and the yoga-organic-fruitarianism phase.
“We never use this room, why don’t we make it into a snooker room?!”
You never know when you will suddenly realise that your once beloved dining room has not been used for months, or was that a year and a half ago now? Or perhaps your little darlings are not so little any more and have fled the nest and you have rooms to get creative with. When changing the function of a space, for example, from a bedroom to a home office, or from a dining room to a home entertainments room you do not want to be limited by the connectivity of that space. Always over-wire!
HD, IPTV, 3G, WIFI… ABC as easy as 123
Technology is changing all the time but perhaps not as frequently and abruptly as the media leads you to think. Making sure that your system is ready for technology now, and the future, really is the job of the custom designer. Knowing a little about upcoming trends and developments will enable you to fire pop quizzes at them which will keep them on their toes. Don’t ever feel intimidated to ask any questions, if you want to ask whether the radiator will be HD compatible you go ahead and ask that!
“It’s an investment honey, think of me as a property developer”
No matter how in love you are with your house, never rule out the possibility of moving. It would therefore be sensible to consider the requirements of future owners, running extra cable for this reason really does not affect the total budget of a project very much. I’m not sure its always best to be safe than sorry, since so many dangerous things are so much fun! But it is definitely better to over-wire the house so that you have undeniably added value to the house and so that it has the flexibility to support any future changes. Once a system is in place the last thing you want to do is retrofit things that make a lot of mess, such as adding more cables and having to chase them into walls.
Remember one of the main reasons why you are having a Smart-Home system built is so that the added value it provides is set against the cost of having it installed, its not just because your happiness relies on it, that would be too self-indulgent, would it not?! That’s what you tell anyone who asks anyway. “It’s an investment” will be the mantra that gets you through the conversations with your partner, family and friends, bank manager and conscience, some of whom will one minute question “why do you need all this stuff?” and then the next coincidentally insist that “we should do this more often” after enjoying the best home cinema experience of their life.
