4 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Home Audio

by ALLISON JARRELL

When warm weather arrives, we find ourselves lingering with a lemonade on the patio, meandering through our lush gardens and floating between soaking up the sunshine and seeking shade indoors. And if you’re a music lover, the ultimate way to set the vibe on days like these is a serotonin-boosting Spotify playlist, or taking your favorite record for a spin. Wouldn’t it be nice, though, if those melodies followed wherever the day takes you?

For Todd Waara and his team at Waara Technologies, audio (and visual) needs are personal. Their aim is to transform your home into a haven that matches your daily rituals. Do you like putting on some jazz while cooking? Listening to the news during your morning shower? Unwinding with a podcast while gardening? Waara has you covered. Here, their team shares the latest sound and visual trends.

Network is your foundation (literally). Say you buy a 2,000-square-foot home. It’s an older house, and you go to a big box store to grab a router. Then Spectrum comes by and installs a modem off in a corner somewhere. But the other side of the house now has weak service and slow internet speed. Sound familiar?

Embracing a good network is key when laying the foundation for audio and sound quality in your home. Waara recommends wiring network access points throughout the house, using commercial-grade products direct from the manufacturer. And while they’re happy to come troubleshoot problems after the fact, he also encourages new homeowners to reach out while they’re in the building stages, so they can wire rooms with personal preferences in mind.

“When you’re building a new house, at the end of the project, when the drywall is going on, is not the time to be thinking of us,” Waara says. “We have a lot of clients that bring us their blueprints and grab us early in the planning stages.”

“To get good sound, you still need a good network and it still needs to be wired,” Waara continues. “We’re not in the age of Star Trek yet.”

Home automation will exceed your expectations. We may not be living in Star Trek times quite yet, but talk to Waara about home automation options for a few minutes and you may feel like you’re entering another dimension. Automation today extends far beyond speakers and TVs in different rooms—Waara and his team can help automate almost anything, from thermostats, Nest doorbells and smart lightbulbs, to voice commands, Jacuzzis and irrigation. “We integrate it all into one app, which makes everything more convenient,” Waara says.

Sound equipment can be hidden pretty much anywhere … “In the last few years, outdoor sound has changed from just a couple speakers on the outside of a house or deck to being more intentional about trying to hide speakers,” Waara says, noting you can bury subwoofers and sneak speakers into landscape lighting.

Indoors, Waara highlights how the science of acoustics has morphed in recent years. Instead of using obvious sound panels to dampen echoing, Waara loves wood-like panels that blend seamlessly with wooden design elements. “You wouldn’t even know these are absorbing sound,” Waara says as he sifts through an array of maple-, oak- and mahoganyhued panels. He then points to what looks like a canvas-wrapped photo print on the wall— in actuality, it’s a front for sound-absorbing fiberglass mesh. “There are so many different styles you can go for,” he says.

… or it can be the bold (and stylishly old-school) centerpiece of a room. Between old-fashioned speakers and turntables straight from the ’60s and ’70s, making a statement with your sound gear is definitely on-trend. Vinyl sales even outpaced CD sales in the U.S. this year, for the first time since 1987. “We still have Spotify, Title and Pandora; they’re here to stay,” Waara says. “But the fun of having a turntable and playing an album, there’s nothing better than that.”