The Challenge...

The old thatched barn was undergoing a major internal and external restoration to make it a new family home. The central living space was being completely refurbished to provide a huge room for the family to relax in, with glass walls on the two long sides and high vaulted ceilings.

Entertainment

Beyond the Invisible were called in to provide a discreet audiovisual entertainment system throughout the property. Most of the rooms were designed for the entertainment system to be part of the background, with speakers mounted in the ceiling and control of the system from the wall. The challenge came when Beyond the Invisible were asked to install an entertainment system into the 15m x 5m living space without changing the aesthetic of the room.

To make the design even trickier, there was a requirement for the room to have two separate entertainment systems blended together. While relaxing with friends, the client wanted a high quality audio system to listen to their extensive CD collection while facing the fireplace. At other times, they wanted to be able to relax in front of a plasma screen with surround sound while watching the latest movie. The plasma screen was on an adjacent wall so the two systems are 900 apart.

Beyond the Invisible installed two separate speaker systems into the living space. A high quality stereo system based around Speakercraft's top of the line AIM 8 Five in-ceiling speakers provided the audio for relaxing with friends, while an Atlantic Technology THX approved in-wall speaker system provided the surround sound movie experience. The Yamaha cinema receiver allows effortless switching between the two speaker systems. If the client selects music the system automatically selects the music speakers, whilst if they select a movie source it selects the other speakers.

Concealed screen

Additionally, a plasma screen was installed in a cloth-covered chest to provide the pictures to go with the movie. The complete system is automatically controlled from a colour touch screen remote control which is designed to make the system delightfully simple to use.

Multi-room Entertainment

To make listening to music around the house easier, a hard disk music server was installed. Now, wherever the client is in the property they are able to call up any of their CDs with a few touches on the remote in the room.

Lighting Control

Lighting control in the Living Room uses a Lutron GrafikEye system. This is perfect for a one room installation allowing the selection of four different scenes. By specifying the American style button pads we could incorporate the GrafikEye panel with the controls for the audio-visual system to eliminate ugly wall-acne.

Back to portfolio listings

Specification

• Lighting Control
  Lutron Graffix Eye
  www.lutron.com 
• Whole House Entertainment
  Speakercraft multi-room entertainment system
  www.speakercraft.com
  
  Marantz  Hard Disk Music Server.
  www.marantz.co.uk
  
  Speakercraft Aim 8 Five ceiling speakers for high quality music reproduction.
  www.speakercraft.com
  
  Atlantic Technology THX approved in-wall speaker system.
  www.atlantictechnology.com
  
  Yamaha Cinema Receiver and DVD player
  www.yamaha-uk.com 
• Control
  MX3000 Colour touch screen remote control.
  www.universalremote.com
• Architect
  Stephen Fletcher
  www.stephen-fletcher.co.uk