By Meg Escott
Home sound insulation may not be the first thing on your mind when you're thinking about the design of your home.
You’ll be spending lots of time and energy on how your home looks. I want to encourage you to consider how your home sounds as well. There’s no point having a home that looks fantastic if the experience of living in it is spoiled by poor home sound insulation.
Sound is, of course, invisible and much of the time we are not consciously aware of it. When’s the last time you thought about the sounds of the spaces you spend time in?
You might like to start by learning a bit about how sound travels.
On this page we'll start by discussing sounds originating from both outside and inside your home, and looking at some ideas that will contribute to good home sound insulation.
Then we’ll move on to how you can enrich your experience of sound in your home. Some of these are a bit wacky but it’s all ideas that you might find interesting to work into your home design.
There's also a few reader stories thrown in.
Listen carefully...
Let’s start by considering the sound in the environment around our homes.
Is your home in a location where there are any undesirable noises? Let's have a look at some of the sources of noise from outside our home.
I have lived in homes that have had a few of these shortcomings. Personally, I find any noise that’s present nearly all the time harder to deal with than intermittent noise. A road that’s busy all the time is a constant drone that’s hard to get away from, although this does tend to calm down at night.
Several experiences come to mind...
Here's a few home design ideas for dealing with outdoor noise.
Let’s move inside now to consider the distinctive sounds of the spaces and rooms that we live in.
The home sound insulation quality of your home is a direct result of the design of the spaces and the interior finishes and furnishings.
If a room needs to feel cosy, it will only be cosy if it also sounds cosy whereas the atmosphere of a playroom might benefit from sounding more vibrant.
First, let's think about the sources of noise inside your home:
There are two main ways of dealing with sound inside your home. Firstly by being smart about the layout of your home and secondly by using some home sound insulation design touches.
Here are a few things to consider about how the layout of your home contributes to your home sound insulation.
Here are some home sound insulation design touches that you can use to solve your sound problems.
With all this home sound insulation remember that it's important you can hear your children or pets if they become distressed during the night!
Once you've got all your home sound insulation in place, here’s a few other ideas for how to enrich the soundscape of your home.
Not all outside noise is bad. What are the types of sounds that make the environment more pleasurable? How about birdsong, the sound of lapping water or the crash of waves, the wind rustling the trees or children playing?
I grew up two doors away from a tennis club. The neighbourhood church was also close by. The ‘pock’ sound of ball meeting string and the laughter or cries of frustration of the players, many of whose voices I would recognise, occasionally interrupted by the call of wood pigeons or church bells marking the time, peeling or ringing out a hymn were the sounds that drifted in through my bedroom window and are just as much part of my childhood home as the house itself.
Here's a few other suggestions.
If you have a driveway or pathway that leads up to your home, how about putting gravel down? This creates the first signal to your mind that you have arrived home. It also puts burglars off!
You either love them or hate them. If you fall into the first category wind chimes make a breeze that much more charming.
If you don't have a babbling brook or ocean near your house, how about a water feature to provide some natural background noise?
Here's a few ideas for enriching your indoor sound experience.
Some rooms naturally have their own sound quality. For example, we sound fabulous singing in the shower because of all the reverberation in the bathroom. The kitchen is often a place of action and so it's appropriate for the sound in the space to feel bright. Then we might have a small, cozy room in our homes where the sound is more dampened by carpet, curtains and soft furniture.
Make design decisions that will mean you can experience different quality of sound in different spaces. This will probably happen quite naturally if you use carpet and curtains in the areas of your home where you want a quiet atmosphere. If you're thinking of tiling or putting wooden floor throughout your entire home, you may need to consider how to change the quality of the sound in some spaces.
Have you considered having a clock in your home?
The ticking and chiming of a clock can be very pleasant sounds. In our home, our clock is like the heartbeat.
If you’re shopping around for an alarm, ask to hear a sample of how the alarm communicates with you, the householder. Of course if there’s an intruder in your home, you want the alarm to sound as loud an offensive as possible. However, as the rightful inhabitant why not choose an alarm that gives you a pleasant sonic experience.
We use our alarm at night. When we set it on night mode and turn it off in the morning, it makes and unpleasant beeping sound, loud enough to disturb anyone who is dozing upstairs which goes on for an unnecessarily long length of time. Very annoying. Why can’t we just have a soft beep to indicate that the alarm has been set or de-activated? Alarm manufacturers of the world take note!
We've already talked about the role that solid doors have to play in home sound insulation, but what about the sound that the door itself makes when it's closed?
Think about car doors. Believe it or not car manufacturers spend time and money engineering how the doors sound when they are closed.
The same goes for the doors in your house. Solid doors closing into solid walls is always going to sound more solid and reassuring than hollow doors closing onto hollow walls. Whatever your budget, talk to your builder or architect about what can be done to make closing the doors feel and sound solid.
When you’re planning your lighting check that the light fittings don’t buzz. If you’re planning to have dimmable lights check that there’s no noise at different levels of lighting.
Shop around for a door bell that you like the sound off. There must be ones that allow a sound or music to be recorded.
Soft closing cupboards avoid unnecessary banging and crashing in the kitchen, laundry, bathroom and closet. Soft closing cupboards are now very affordable with absorbers available that work with doors hung on standard hinges.
Lining your drawers and cupboards with a rubber, felt or leather mat (or any other material appropriate) means that the noise is absorbed when you put glasses or pots and pans away. This may be taking things too far, but it comes as an option for many kitchens.
A well built home shouldn’t have any creaks, but I read once about a client that requested a creaky floorboard and a squeaky hinge be introduced into the design just to give the home a sense of character!
There’s an interactive science museum in Belfast that we go to occasionally where walking up the stairs and along some of the corridors is a sonic journey. The technology behind this is made by OM Interactive. Image a sort of light beam instrument on the stairs, or in the shower, or in the WC! I like the idea of our homes becoming more playful and interactive and for me this mix of sound and light appeals.
Here's a few reader stories for you where home sound insulation fell by the wayside.
Jane is a mother of 6 and was lucky enough to have the opportunity to remodel their kitchen space to include a generous kitchen and big family dining space. The space worked brilliantly with a highly functional kitchen and plenty of space for a big table without anything feeling crowded. The new room had floor to ceiling glazing on two sides offering lovely views onto the garden, tiled floors and a flat, uniform ceiling.
The one problem – when the family were all in for dinner chatting away, Jane and her husband could hardly hear themselves think. They had a home sound insulation nightmare on their hands. Their beautiful room was designed with no regard for the effect that the space design and finishes would have on the sound of the space.
Jane had to call in an acoustic engineer to sort out the issue. The solution was several sound absorption boxes placed at strategic points on the ceiling, several pieces of fabric stretched over batons to hang on the walls (these actually looked pretty artistic) and installing some translucent blinds in front of the windows.
Sarah had a beautiful curved eating niche built as an addition to the family kitchen. Immediately as the family first sat down to their first meal in the space the problem made itself obvious. Two seats at the table had everything they said echoed right back at them.
Drawing the curtains solves the problem, but that’s not practical during the day and besides would obscure the view to the garden.
Most of the time, they just avoid sitting in the two affected seats.
If you're facing sound problems you could call in a home sound insulation expert.
In conclusion, when you’re designing your new home, ask yourself and the professionals that are working with you, ‘What will this space sound like?’, 'Is there enough home sound insulation', and ‘Are there any design touches we can add to enhance the sound experience?’
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