Top 6 Features We Love About Our Smart Home

We’re finally home! After moving into our new smart home, we came up with a list of our favorite home automation ideas so far that make our ives easier.

1. Ambient Lighting Moods
2. Individual Room Temperature Control
3. Automated Fireplace For Cozy Nights
4. One-Click Cinema To Instantly Start Movie Night
5. Personal Wakeup Playlist For Morning Routine
6. Garage “Comfort Leaving” For Peace Of Mind and Security

1. Ambient Lighting Moods

When you move into a new home, you want to make it feel just right. This was easy for us will the full customization of lighting moods throughout the entire space.

We used mostly LED Spots and Strips. After just a week, the neighbors already knew us as “the home with the lights”.

Here are some of our favorite lighting moods:

Party mood! We’re now ready to host some friends.

Cooking Mood: We can brighten up the kitchen with just a tap on the Touch switch.

Cozy Mood: We reated a feeling of warmth and coziness for a winter’s night.

2. Room Temperature Control

Our heating and cooling system is set up with smart controls to ensure the perfect temperature throughout every room. We have individual temperature zones for every single room: kitchen 70°F, bedroom 67°F, office 69°F. They’re always at the right temperature at the right time of the day.

The setup is pretty simple with the HVAC hooked up to the Loxone Miniserver and Dampers installed to control the airflow to the individual rooms.

3. Automated Fireplace

Did you know that half of all homes built in the US have a fireplace built in them? We love the glow of our fireplace, especially on cold or rainy days. With automation controls, now it switches on and off automatically when these three points are met at the same time:

• There is motion in the living room, and… 
• It is dark outside, and…
• the outside temperature drops below 35°F

This feature makes a huge difference to make our home feel more inviting.

4. One-Click Cinema 

We’re also lucky enough to have an awesome home cinema. At the touch of a button, it’s ready for us to binge the latest series on Netflix. By turning on the TV with the standard TV remote, our home will know to activate our movie light scene as well as turn off the music to get us ready for movie night.

5. Personal Wake-up Music

My personal favorite: We set up our home to play music in our bathrooms automatically as my morning routine begins. When I enter the bathroom, it plays my “Get Up & Go” playlist. And when I step out of the bathroom, it will turn off automatically. I can even switch the music sources and change the volume with the Loxone Touch on the wall so I don’t have to look for my cell if I want to listen to something different.

6. Comfort Leaving

We have a remote in our car, not your standard garage door remote, but a powerful Loxone remote that is fully integrated into our smart home system. It controls the two garage doors and we have one button to activate our “Comfort Leaving” mode. This button will close the garage door, turn off lights and music in the whole house, switch off the TV and arm the alarm system.