Science fiction novelist William Gibson said “The future is here, it is just not evenly distributed”. Moore Young designs the future and brings it into clients’ homes today. Working with developers, they’re also bringing the future to new projects for the mass market.

Design Engineer and Director, Stuart Young is passionate about how this future will be achieved. “Good design is not about having the latest gadgets - it’s not about gadgets at all. Our focus is how good technology can enhance the lives of our clients through the way they experience their homes and through excellence in design.”
And true to their word the Moore Young company motto is “The Spaces We Live In”. Surprising coming from a company of geeks David Ivory, Director of the Hong Kong office, laughs. “Architects are just geeks that dress well.
And we think that architects should not have a monopoly on good dress sense. We have an incredible focus on the aesthetics of our clients’ homes.
By working with the other geeks on the project we ensure our systems are designed in harmony with the overall architecture.” In bringing a technical sensibility to a project’s design, Moore Young prefer to be part of the design process from the beginning. “Absolutely,” Young says.
“If we came in at the tail end of the design process, or worse, after construction has started, then the aesthetics and the technology will be compromised.” Much of the intelligence in the systems Moore Young design for is inherent in the way technology is used. Their approach is to solve problems before they occur or are even thought of.

It is expensive to install conduits after the finishes are installed, so architects need to be aware of what may be required for the future. And this future may only be 2 or 3 years away, well within the design period of a typical high rise development. “We enable future innovations to be easily implemented as and when they come available,” Ivory says. “We’re already considering how wireless power will impact on the way devices are used.”
There is a risk that architectural design will become slave to the needs of the latest technology trends but Moore Young argue that good design allows for future flexibility and a certain predictability to technology requirements.
Often what is changing the fastest is affordability, ease of use and the likelihood that more people will want this experience in their own homes.
“The Kaleidescape Movie and Music server system is a great example of this.
The new Kaleidescape Mini-System is more functional than the systems from previous years, at a third of the price. We’ve understood this for a long time,”
Young says. “And we’re working on the cutting edge of home technology integration so we’re preparing for when the mass market is ready for such concepts. We also develop our own technology in-house, when our vision for what is possible has not yet reached the general market.”
PRC has seen, or rather not seen, some of these innovations. The Moore Young demonstration suite in Hong Kong hides such wonders as invisible loudspeakers and light switches. Wave your hand in the direction of the wall and the light mode changes. Much of the system is controlled by an iPod Touch using a custom designed interface. This was impressive enough for a billionaire yacht owner to commission the technology for his super yacht.
What’s remarkable about Moore Young’s approach is they’re not just dealing with the super rich. “We want to bring this (integrated solutions) to clients at a price level that anyone buying a new middle class apartment in Hong Kong or China can have as a simple upgrade from their standard installation,” says Ivory. “It’s not gadgetry and toys - it’s managing what everyone will soon have anyway. How many remotes do you have in your living room Our clients have one - their iPhone.”

Several years ago few people thought to install data cables throughout their homes. Developers didn’t identify the need to. Some developments only ever installed telephone lines to one, or perhaps two locations in the home.
Today good designers identify a central location where the incoming telephone and data lines can be managed by a data switch and then routed throughout the home to each bedroom or wherever there may be a television or computer.
This has been standard practice in Moore Young designed residential projects for over a decade.
Moore Young is enthused about Apple’s concept of a hub combining a home’s digital devices into an ecology managed by an Apple Mac. “It’s an analogy we use a lot,” Director Robert Moore says. “Once we have a central controller installed into our client’s homes we can integrate other services to perform as one. A brain of choice for high end homes is Vantage from the USA. The prestigious lighting and automation company was recently acquired by the French multinational Legrand. This again is where expertise of ground breaking technology mixes with European aesthetics comes in to play.”
Ivory agrees. “We’re very focused on working with architects and lighting designers to create wonderful spaces and one of the key elements of a beautiful space is lighting. Ask any cinematographer and they’ll agree. A great lighting design is like make up on a woman, it enhances the inherent natural beauty with subtle highlights and glows.”
“This however could mean a lot of lighting circuits and switches,” Young adds.
“Aesthetically this is undesirable and practically it is difficult to remember
which switch does what. So we use Vantage to control the lighting scenes. The central processor manages the lights and you simply instruct how you’d like to use the space. The system will select the lighting levels and circuits to change autonomously.”
“Vantage can be your personal cinematographer, always ready to light your scene perfectly every time. Wave your hand over an invisible switch to say you want light and Vantage composes the scene for you.”
“Invisible is somewhat extreme.” Young says. “In most installations we would install an invisible switch behind the wall finish and then highlight the location with a change in pattern or wall texture. Our favourite design was one we developed with Hong Kong Architects HEAD. We placed the invisible switches behind a layer of Corian that was backlit with LED, then grooved the surface so that the area glowed in the shape of words and letters. You touch words creating a poem and sequence triggers lights to change, music to play and blinds to close.”
“That’s what we mean when we say that aesthetics are important to us. But so is practicality,” Ivory says. “To us often they are the same thing. For instance, the ultimate home AV system is one where you can not see anything until you want to watch a movie. So we hide the systems away, placing them in a central location. This means we can situate the equipment in a rack, making it easy to manage, cool and clean. Thus the aesthetics of hiding also works to increase practicality.”

“In Hong Kong and China often the living space needs to double as the home theatre but who wants huge loudspeakers dominating the room So unfortunately people will select small speakers that are often expensive with poor sound quality. Imagine a child trying to sing like Pavarotti or a 4-cylinder car trying to sound like a V8, hopefully you get the point. We’re able to install invisible loudspeakers into walls and ceilings so that a warm, rich and fuller sound can fill the room. You can’t see them, but you can certainly hear them.”
How much of this is readily available for the masses “Most of it actually,” Ivory says. “Vantage is used for higher end homes but that is just one of the systems that we specify in our projects.”
Moore Young are working to introduce new ideas and solutions to Hong Kong and China traditionally targeting Europe, Middle East and the US. An example of these is the latest developments from Opus. Opus allows central music sources to send their music to multiple locations in the home. Each can be controlled and managed separately, or have a second sub-zone in another room such as a bathroom. The interface for Opus is a simple touchscreen that can display an interface similar to that of an iPod Touch or iPhone. "Opus is more than just a way to control your music collection,” Ivory says. “Opus touchscreens can display controls for the air conditioning, ventilation, hot water systems and lighting. There are additional interface elements required to do this - but Opus provides the interface at an affordable price - and that’s where the integration of other technologies becomes possible.” Moore Young describe themselves as CIT (Communication Integration Technology) system integrators, uniting and making sense of the chaos that currently reigns in our ever increasingly gadget strewn homes.
“You know the future really is here, and it’s looking bright,” says Ivory. “It’s not so bright you need to wear shades, but if you have the right attitude..."
The geeks shall inherit the earth "Yeah and we’re not talking about just the architects. We dress pretty well too.”

This large family home in Qingdao brings together Moore Young’s expertise in integrating the home’s lighting control systems and music and movie management. Of greatest concern for the client is simplicity and ease of use. The large indoor pool area has a simple interface that manages the lighting, including the LED pool lights, and allows music to be easily played to create a relaxing atmosphere for exercise, or for a pool party. A dedicated WiFi network provides connectivity for Moore Young’s iPhone application that provides the main interface to the intelligence in the home. A series of keypads and Opus touchpads allow each room to be tuned to precisely the needs of the user. All systems are built on a robust infrastructure from Legrand’s Vantage Controls product line for dimming systems and all key automation interfaces. Media management is provided by Kaleidescape Systems with more than 20 screens and music zones being able to tap into the rich store of music and movies for instant playback. It is an art to integrate a cohesive and simple experience that does not detract from the architecture of the space, and adds to a client’s enjoyment of their home. Moore Young with this project continue to integrate tried and true methodologies with the latest in technology to achieve Sight Sound Simplicity.