It’s sleek, sassy and minimalist. Your new house is just as you wanted! But bloody hell, it is so noisy!!
Truth be told room acoustics are far more complex than most people realise. It is also sadly a forgotten area in some new build and renovation projects.
You don’t need to dedicate weeks to it, but think about it in every step of your design decision process. You don’t need to go over the top as serious audiophiles do. They can tinker with their sound room for months or years to ‘deaden’ or ‘liven’ the sound in the room. Oh, and you guessed it, each upgrade of the hifi system usually requires a re-assessment of the room.
But let’s not get as serious as audiophiles do. I am not going down the path of several recent ‘noisy home’ articles on furnishings and wall/floor coverings – which are all valid.
Take a more systemic approach. Discuss with your architect on the ‘liveability’ of your design, e.g. open plan usually features multiple simultaneous possible activities in one space. You need to ask yourself what is the concurrency, frequency and noise levels of those activities?
You are possibly thinking how is this all relevant to a blog about Smart Habitats? True, this is left of field, but you have to get the house design right to make sure you can use and enjoy your smart environment. There is little point investing and building a multi-room, multi-user solution if you cannot enjoy it.
Do yourself a favour, be an audiophile for a day, listen to what really goes on in your home, preferably pre-renovation. Think of the changes you want to make and how that will impact noise levels in certain spaces. If you want a really simple experiment, repeat listening to your home with ear muffs on. Seriously! You will appreciate what some attenuation of sound will do and which noises really carry through your home.
Stay safe. Be Smart!