Dr. Who Meets Star Trek in Sci-Fi Theater
By Lisa Montgomery
This far-out home theater doubles the pleasure of its sci-fi theme.

It’s hard to believe the original plan for this theater was to cart in the owners’ existing 60-inch TV and put in a small surround-sound system. The owners felt the setup would be perfectly adequate for their newly finished bonus room … until they met with the custom electronics professionals (CE pros) at Gramophone, Timonium, Md.

“After showing them what was possible, they saw the light,” says sales manager Jeff Hudkins. Soon, the basic plan grew into a “theme” theater, complete with controllable colored LED lighting.



It’s mainly Star Trek inside the 23-by-30-foot space, including wall designs with views of space and the Enterprise. The entrance to the room, however, is fashioned after the British TV show, Dr. Who. The two themes complement each other well, says Hudkins. “We made the 8-by-4-foot entrance look like Dr. Who’s Tardis, the telephone-booth style time machine he would use to go backward and forward in time.”

Just as Dr. Who would, the owners step through the Tardis to be transported to a new world—the sci-fi theater. To emulate the Tardis “in flight,” occupancy sensors set off a swirling light show and an audio clip from the Dr. Who show.

As it does in the Tardis, colored LED lighting plays a big part in the portrayal of the sci-fi theme in the theater. Wall sconces, cove fixtures, and twinkling fiber-optic ceiling lights all contribute to the effect. The owners can choose from any of five preset lighting scenes, or tweak the color, pattern and intensity of the lights individually from a wireless Crestron touchpanel.

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