The design of the Lucas Museum has finally been revealed. While it’ll be located… far, far away from its original destination, Star Wars fans can finally get a glimpse of this temple of story telling. It will touch down on the Chicago lakefront, and it’s been fast-tracked by the city for swift approval.
The George Lucas Museum Of Narrative Art – a building commissioned by Lucas and devoted to sharing the history of narrative storytelling – looks like it was pulled straight out of a Star Wars story line. Me, I’d say it’d look right at home on Alderaan (if the Empire hadn’t, y’know, blown it up). The $300M museum is located on a beautiful plot of land on Chicago’s lakefront – although that’s not where it was originally supposed to be built.
According to Lucas’s team , their boss originally wanted his museum to be built in his home town, San Francisco, specifically in Golden Gate National Park’s Presidio. Unfortunately, Presidio Trust rejected Lucas’s proposals without an explanation. So instead, Lucas turned to Chicago – and got a much warmer welcome from mayor Rahm Emanuel, who basically old him he could built the museum just about anywhere he wanted. The museum will be a stone’s throw away from The Adler Planetarium, The Shedd Aquarium, The Museum of Natural History, and the home arena of the Chicago Bears.
Lucas has brought in some big names to make this dream of his a reality. The Beijing-based MAD Architects were brought in to design the pyramid. Acclaimed architecture firm Studio Gang was commissioned to build a bridge to a nearby island. And finally, Chicago-based VOA associates was brought in to manage the whole project – all of which is being designed with the history of the area in mind.
End result? Once the Lucas Museum Chicago opens in 2020, I expect that it’ll fast become one of the most prominent destinations in the city. I’m definitely going to pay it a visit.
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Lucas Museum Chicago Designs | Gallery
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The American poet Robert Frost once said, “Geofences make good neighbors”. Okay, maybe not, but a geofence makes for an efficient home environment. Geofencing is a relatively new technology that makes gadgets like the Honeywell Lyric smart thermostat so promising. It’s a kind of spacial awareness that can recognize when you approach and perform an action on your behalf. I tested a Lyric to see geofencing in action, and to see what impact it could have on my indoor climate. When my Lyric arrived, the concept “geofencing” was alien to me. Today, it’s something I just can’t shut up about.
In layman’s terms, a geofence is an invisible boundary around your neighborhood that recognizes when you approach. When you cross that invisible line, the Honeywell Lyric heats or cools your home to a desired temperature before you walk in the door. There’s no pattern learning or schedule programming needed — it just turns on before you arrive and shuts down when you depart. In the mean time, the HVAC is dormant, keeping your heating and cooling bills to a minimum.
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Geofencing isn’t a new technology. It’s been used in academic and private environments for about a decade, but it’s never been widely employed in consumer tech. Before the Lyric, geofencing had been tested in child location services, vehicle theft alerts, wildlife tracking and other applications. Honeywell has taken this mostly-theoretical technology and given it a common application in a next-gen thermostat. The timing is perfect for Honeywell, because nearly all of us are carrying around network-enabled geolocation devices in our pockets. Your app-enabled iPhone or Android device is the “other half” of the geofencing formula that makes the Honeywell Lyric a great introduction for this technology.
It’s geofencing that makes the Lyric a stand-out among smart thermostats. Others require a programmed schedule or time to learn your habits. The Lyric works immediately once it’s set up, and recognizes when you and your smart phone depart or approach.
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Installation is a breeze. The Honeywell Lyric app guides you through the process from start to finish. I have very little experience with electrical work at home, but I have an understanding of the basics. It was essential to cut power on my circuit breaker and to photograph the wiring of the old thermostat I was replacing. The rest of the steps were clearly guided in the Lyric app. In minutes, the Lyric was powering up, asking for WiFi network permissions and ready to keep me comfortable.
Once the Honeywell Lyric was running, I was ready to set up my geofence. In my case, the Lyric will be connected to three devices — an iPad and two Nexus 5 smartphones. Both my wife and I work from home or close by, so our geofences are set at 500 feet. When we’re both away, our home HVAC goes dormant. Just how “dormant” is also up to us, as we can set a maximum and minimum temperature to balance savings and a healthy environment for our pets. It’s entirely up to us, and we can control all of these settings from our mobile devices as needed.
That’s another feature that’s important to note: the Honeywell Lyric isn’t solely operated by geofencing. I can control my home’s temperature from my smartphone whenever I want. I can adjust the temperature without leaving my desk throughout the day. And I can still control the thermostat from the device itself, using the touchscreen on the central display. For all intents and purposes, it’s a thermostat, but it can be controlled remotely from a smartphone and it can be managed automatically from the geofencing system.
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As a technophile, I’ve enjoyed the Honeywell Lyric for more than its stated purpose. It’s an excellent thermostat. It’s an ideal introduction into smart home technology. For me, however, there’s more to it. It has me wondering just how far geofencing can go, and what kind of value it can have for the smart homes of tomorrow.
Can a geofence alert us when a package is about to be delivered? Can a geofence let us know when Fido gets loose? In the future, can it alert our maidbot to begin preparing dinner? Will the snowblower bot clear our driveway before we arrive? The applications for geofencing technology are limited only by our imagination.
For now, I’m just thrilled to see geofencing in action. It’s used by the Honeywell Lyric to keep a home comfortable and efficient. That’s the whole point — to conserve energy and save money when you don’t need your HVAC running. In a phrase, “comfort need not be costly”. And no, Robert Frost didn’t say that either.
The Geofencing-Powered Honeywell Lyric Smart Thermostat | Gallery
