Case studies

Edwardian Façade Hides a High-Tech Haven (19/4/2006)

By Schneider Electric

The exterior of an otherwise pleasant but unassuming suburban end of terrace Edwardian house, adjacent to Wimbledon Park, belies the high technology home that hides within. This is the home of Jane Scotland and husband Simon, who jointly formed the home entertainment systems design company Beyond The Invisible, and it bristles with lighting, audio, video, cinema and PC networking control.

The five-bedroom house has about forty distinct lighting circuits that can be used to set moods of each room in the house linked and controlled by a system called C-Bus from Clipsal, a brand of Schneider Electric. Beyond The Invisible uses the home as a showpiece for what can be achieved with its Clipsal technology.

Let there be light

First evidence of the system is a tiny Clipsal touchscreen monitor by the front door as one enters the hallway. This panel can switch all sorts of functions within the house, including turning on or off all the lights, and setting heating timers. A nice touch is to set lights in a dimmed mode for anyone coming in late and not wanting to wake the other occupants of the home.

Entering the brightly-lit open plan living/kitchen/dining area that takes up perhaps two thirds of the ground floor area, stylish Clipsal switches are located conveniently to allow the occupants to set as many lighting scenes as they like. Jane Scotland points out that while there is really no limit to the combinations of lighting that can be programmed with the system, most of Beyond The Invisible's clients find they actually use regularly only three or four settings in most rooms.

Open plan living/kitchen/dining area

In the bathrooms, the latest Clipsal Saturn switches are used. These are elegant accessories that can be colour co-ordinated, making them an attractive proposition for interior designers. Again, mood lighting and even the extraction fans are controlled.

Another neat feature in the Scotland's bathroom is that the lights automatically turn on when someone enters - a feature appreciated by visitors who might otherwise fumble for the light switch!

Stacked with home entertainment

The most impressive elements in the Scotland's house are the rack of hi-fi, TV and DVD equipment concealed behind a hinged wood panel. This neat stack of state-of-the-art home electronics provides whole-house entertainment including flat panel TVs in rooms - all of which have access to a 400 DVD stack and a library of music CDs, together with satellite TV and even foreign-language satellite broadcasts.

There is a further computer network, run in standard Ethernet Cat5 cabling that gives computer access in a variety of rooms together with TV link up to the PC, typically to enable big-screen Internet browsing.

Surveillance cameras displayed on TV screen

In the market for prestige properties

The home entertainment/lighting control systems Beyond The Invisible designs are largely for prestige properties in central London and along the M3 stockbroker corridor. Typically, the installations cost £35,000 but can go as high as £100,000 or more. This might seem a hefty price tag, but for million-pound plus residences, it is a price the occupants are more than prepared to pay for comfort, security and convenience. At present, the company has about thirty projects planned using the Clipsal system. "One of the benefits the clients get," explains Jane Scotland, "is the fact that the Clipsal C-Bus is so robust and reliable. It is an industrial grade network that supports lighting and control systems without fail. Nobody wants to discover after the installation that the lights or heating don't work very well - or even at all!"

Lighting in the dining area

As Scotland predicts, soon there will be a raft of home buyers who are insistent on having such lighting control/home entertainment/home computing networks in the houses they consider. This trend, which is already accelerating, will spur even greater numbers of architects, builders and developers to install control networks during building and major refurbishment work.

As a final word, Jane freely admits she could no longer live without her own system. "Anyone who has experienced a home entertainment and control system like this would be hooked for life" she concluded.

Clipsal equipment list:

2 x 8 Channel 1A Dimmers.
1 x 4 Channel 2A Dimmer.
2 x 8 Channel 10A Relays.
1 x IR Transmitter Unit.
2 x Temperature Sensors.
1 x Pascal Automation Controller.
1 x Monochrome Touchscreen.
2 x PIRs.
1 x Multisensor.
4 x Reflection Key Switches.
3 x Neo Switches.
2 x Saturn Switches.
3 x Saturn DLT Switches.
1 x Network Interface Unit.
1 x Wireless Gateway.
3 x C-Bus Wireless Saturn Switches.
4 x C-Bus Wireless Dimmers.

www.schneider.co.uk