“Once you go downstairs to the media room, it’s fun time,” says Patrick. “Friday is Mom’s night. Sunday night is our night, we do whatever. The home theatre gives us all a chance to be together and have fun. Before we   play games at the kitchen table. For my teenage daughters, their friends can come over and watch movies so they don’t have to spend money going out to movies.”

Walking downstairs, Patrick proudly gives the grand tour of her media room. First, you encounter the home theatre area with its two tiers of seating, 106-inch screen, projector and acoustic walls in greens, blues and tan. The equipment is mostly hidden away in the coat closet. Across the room, a poker table and bar area beckon. “We didn’t have room for a pool table,” laughs Patrick. “And I don’t know how to play poker yet.” Back in fall 2005, their 20X30 basement was renovated from three dark rooms to their current L-shaped media room.

“We are seeing a lot of families with children entering the teen years putting some form of theatre or other in their home,” says Rod Moysey, general manager of Calgary’s General Audio (http://www.general-audio.com ) “We are trending up from last year – home theatre is becoming more popular every year as pricing on quality products drops.”

Most Calgarians Patrick knows with home theatres have hired companies to design and install them rather than do it themselves. Patrick and her husband turned to interior designer Elizabeth Arsenault of Calgary’s Smart Home Systems (http://www.smarthomesystems.com) , to design their media room. “It was tremendous, so much easier,” says Patrick. “Liz was very creative and energetic. There’s a nice, refreshing, contemporary concept overall in the media room.”

Arsenault says increasingly Calgarians are installing dedicated home theatres or a media room because they’re choosing to entertain more at home. The newest trend, the media room, typically combines a projector, two or three plasma TVs, a pool table and a bar. “There’s the nesting factor of people staying at home with their family,” says Arsenault. “It’s more enjoyable (in the home theatre), you can sit back and watch a movie or a sports event and enjoy a beer.”

Calgary clients who have been coming to the interior designer have been committing budgets averaging $30,000 to $70,000 on varying home theatre projects. One recent client, an old movie buff, wanted to recreate the theatre he once worked in himself. Another client chose a medieval, old world style while another adopted a Roman style with multiple columns.

“The popularity of home theatres in Calgary is at an all-time time high,” says Trevor Ternes, project manager at Calgary’s K & W Audio (http://www.kwaudio.com). “With technology moving at an unprecedented pace, we are seeing an interesting merge between our industry and the computer industry. This is a very exciting time as it is opening up many options to the client.”

Now, Ternes says its very possible to have all your media (music, movies, photos etc.) sitting on a storage device in your Utility room, streaming to all your TV’s, monitors and PCs throughout the house. This capability reduces clutter and the repetition of gear throughout the rooms. All CDs and DVDs can be stored away in a closet because you can now access them quickly and directly from the comfort of your couch, he says.

HOTTEST SELLERS AND NEW PRODUCTS
What are the current hottest sellers and new products on the home theatre market in Calgary? “Network Media Streamers, in some form, are probably one of the most sought after pieces of gear right now and iPOD integration,” says Ternes. “HD DVD and Blue Ray DVD Players will be a hot topic. Whether or not either of these formats will take off right away is yet to be seen. For the gamer, we will see the new Playstation 3 released as well. With prices falling constantly on Plasma and LCD televisions, these will remain a hot item with larger sizes becoming more affordable.”

Depending on the company/retailer, product lines they carry can really vary in system control, projector, project screens, AV receivers, speakers, DVD & music management, multi-room control, lighting cables and more. Though this year, as in many previous years, Moysey says “Panasonic is leading the way in the Plasma TV market. As far as the large screen TV is concerned JVC is building a very nice product in their HDILA line. If you’re looking for the “real theatre” experience you have to go with a projection system and screen.”

BIGGER IS BETTER
Bigger is better. At least if Canadians have any say in the matter. A recent Ipsos Reid survey, sponsored by HP Canada, found the following:

Nearly half (44 per cent) of survey respondents said their ideal TV size would be between
42 and 50 inches
25 per cent wanted a 50 inch or larger screen size
60 per cent want their TVs to serve as a media
hub for access to movies, music and the internet
41 per cent wanted a big screen
for watching movies
39 per cent for watching TV shows
Only 11 percent wanted a big TV for watching sports (although that number was 23 per cent among men)
Size does matter more to men, however, with
28 per cent of men (versus 18 per cent of women) wanting the 50-65 inch sets
28 per cent of Albertans covet the giant screens, tops in Canada, while significantly less than half that number of Maritimers (12 per cent) would welcome the 50-65-inch sets in their homes.