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Let’s face it, style and technology haven’t always mixed, especially when it comes to home decor. Bright lights. Boxy speakers. Tube TVs. Even in science fiction films—where you can literally make up your own fashion-friendly tech gadgets—it’s all a bunch of oblong furniture, whitewashed color palettes, and neon signage.
Sure, the real stuff’s gotten better over the years, thanks to shrinking CPUs and wireless technology, but whether it’s a bulky smart plug, a hockey puck-like temperature control unit, or a white-on-white smart home automation hub, the styles of these items leave a lot to be desired.
Thankfully, there are some new tech gadget gurus out there working hard to fuse fashion with functionality in order to create items that would do well in a home’s decor.
Here’s a list of the best that are either on the horizon or available today.
A Customizable Home Sound System
Anyone alive in the ‘80s and ‘90s knows what a sweet home sound system used to look like. It was very big and very boxy, it came in silver or black, and no matter the manufacturer, it always required a master electrician and a series of cabinets and shelves to keep it all in line.
Nowadays, however, sound systems have shrunk into cylinders and bars, and much has been integrated into TVs. But there’s one piece of up-and-coming technology that’s literally breaking the mold of the traditional sound system and taking it to a whole new fashion-friendly frontier.
Bang & Olufsen’s BeoSound Shape, with its wireless technology, hexagonal design, and ranged color palette, is not only a designer’s dream in terms of style, but it might very well be the future of tech-savvy home decor.
Each tile serves a separate function, acting as either an amplifier or a dampener depending on the setup, and up to 44 individual speakers can be combined to form a range of shapes and patterns.
As it stands now, the product is primarily meant for music, and it hasn’t yet hit the market—it’s due out in the fall—so you’ll have to wait to try it out. But if it looks as cool as it does online, and if the sound is as epic as advertised, then we can imagine this technology blossoming into an all-in-one, fashion-forward sound system worthy of any living room.
A Gallery-Worthy TV
We’ve all been privy of the progress of TVs. Once wide, bulky, and heavier than everything else in the house, they have since slimmed down to the point of near-nonexistence. And while some brands are bending their products in the name of design and functionality, I prefer mine to fit seamlessly in with a home’s decor.
For that, we turn to The Frame.
Aptly named, Samsung’s artistically inspired television acts as a traditional, Netflix-bingeing TV when you’re watching it and a portrait of art and family photography when it’s not in use. (You can even hang it like an actual art piece or set it upon an easel-like stand for that fancy studio vibe.)
It comes preprogrammed with nearly a hundred works of art. It can sense your presence and turn off when you’re not in the room. And the item is fully customizable, down to the frame, which snaps on and off for differing styles and motifs.
Futuristic Refrigerators
I’m not a big fan of turning every item into an app-based apparatus. I find it intrusive. But when you add the sleekness of a stainless-steel refrigerator with just the right pop of technology, you get an appliance that’s worth redesigning the cabinets over.
Such is the case with Samsung’s Family Hub and LG’s InstaView refrigerators, both of which come equipped with smart home, touchscreen technology.
The capabilities of these products are pretty outrageous and probably unnecessary—from voice control to TV mirroring to music streaming—but we’re not really worried about all that. They’re stylish in their design, sophisticated in their use, and they have just the right splash of technology, which is exactly what you’re looking for in a newly fashionable fridge.
Plus, the whiteboard and note-taking features make for cozy-yet-cool family-friendly vibes.
Mood-Adjustable LED Lighting
If you’re looking for a less expensive option, but one that will still increase the modernity, style, and functionality of your abode, then LED lighting is where you should turn.
There’s no single product to showcase here, as LED lights are as broad and as wide-ranging as the homes they’re installed in, but some of the more noteworthy brands include Cree, GE, Philips, and Osram.
What’s important here is that LED lighting can drastically alter the mood and the look of a home. You can brighten up the living room, add a blueish hue to your bedroom, adjust the lights for easier reading, make the dining room dimmable, or have certain items pop with a pizazz that was previously absent.
(For further reading, TechHive’s Christopher Null has a pretty awesome article that breaks down color temperatures.)
And while traditional white and near-white lights are great for commonly used rooms, an LED’s ability to harbor every other color under the sun means you have plenty of design options for other rooms as well.
Some colorful LED lighting options include:
- Kitchen cabinet highlighting
- Bar highlighting
- Swimming pool accent lighting
- Landscape lighting
- Kids’ bedroom lighting
- Kids’ playroom lighting
An Artistic Air Purifier
The last item on this list is something that’s as unique as it is useful. It’s also something that homeowners are reluctant to put out in the open because its typically one of the uglier things in the home. That item is the air purifier.
Sometimes white, sometimes black, often a mix of hospital grays, air purifiers have long been relegated to the rooms of flu-ridden family and friends on account of their bulbous and unsightly design. No longer.
Enter the Airocide APS-200, an item that could very well be mistaken for modern art. It’s long, slim body and open construction make for an interesting visual, and its outer wooden sleeve matches well with modern decor.
It also has the non-fashionable benefit of harboring some state-of-the-art, NASA-bred technology, which means your home’s air quality will be better than it’s ever been before.
Bottom Line
Finding tech gadgets and appliances that work well with a home’s design can be difficult, especially in a crowded field. But if you look hard enough, you can find all kinds of items—from honeycomb sound systems to canvas-cloning TVs—that will make your home as fashionable and as functional as you want it to be.