The Wall Street Journal celebrated its 125th birthday last month by inviting leading thinkers, innovators and artists to share their visions of where the world is heading. Architect Sarah Susanka, author of the "Not So Big" series of books, gave her predictions for the house of the future.
In her article, Sarah Susanska said she thought the house of the future will not look all that different because we are creatures of habit and tend to hold onto the things that make us feel 'at home'. But she predicts that the what the house contains and allows us to do will be quite different... rather than just be a place to live, it will be a portal to the world.
DESIGN
The house of the future will be...
- Smaller in square footage but will feel bigger because there will be very little unused space... you will only have rooms you actually use
- More informal in character... designed for comfort and conviviality
- Universal design will become standard practice... designed for changing needs throughout life
- Less expensive and easier to maintain... concerned with conservation of resources
TECHNOLOGY
The house of the future will be...
- Everything will be wireless, and all devices, appliances and control systems will talk to each other with ease, making upgrades far less difficult
- In our future world, whole surfaces will be the light source, changing the color and light intensity of the walls and ceilings and maybe even the floors of your home, adjusting them to different presets
- "Smart homes" is one of the big shifts headed our way, with everything connected to the smart home automation system...to such a degree that homes of today will be the equivalent of a typewriter compared to a state-of-the-art computer
- Instead of merely a place to live, home of the future will be portals to access the world around us
- Homes offices may have one wall entirely video screen projecting the world of fellow workers, so you have the experience of working with them, but in the comnfort of your own home
- Windows with built-in photovoltaics, see-through when the weather is great, or become a projection surface, allowing you to select from a myriad real-time locations
CONSTRUCTION
The house of the future...
- Will use 3D immersion technology to try on different floor plans, so that we can feel a new place before it is built
- Will be built with precision in a factory setting, just like our cars are today... and brought to the site in large panels that can be assembled and completed in less than a week
- Has the potential to more closely resemble a cottage in the south of France than a house in suburbia, it will be your portal to everywhere
Sharlene Hensrud - Email- Twin Cities Realtor
HomesMSP Team with RE/MAX Results--Sharlene, John, Angela
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