Design Your Media Room for the Way You Use It

We've talked before about media rooms as entertainment SUVs. The ever-popular SUV is prized for its carry-anything, go-anywhere versatility. The media room can be an equally versatile entertainment center, just as comfortable when hosting a Bears watch party on a Sunday afternoon as enjoying family movie night with the latest Marvel epic. So what does that mean for your media room installation? 

Your media room doesn’t need to follow any rules. Not that you needed to follow them anyway. To some, home theaters are more "formal" entertainment spaces, while media rooms are more fluid. In other words, anything goes in media rooms. It can be a home theater-esque space with fixed theater lounge seating or a more freeform game room. Regardless of which way you want to roll, you get to decide what setup is right for you. And along that line, if you are considering a media room project, here are some things to spark some ideas for your "SUV" entertainment space in your Chicago, IL home. 

Build a Dedicated Media Room as an Entertainment and Fun Hub

TVs were once these big, bulky things that demanded their own focal point in a room. Do you remember the large-screen TVs of the mid-2000s? Rear projection 50-inch-and-up models came in huge heavy cabinets that competed with fireplaces in your living or family room. And while those TVs had arguably better speakers than today's flat panels, that didn't include the sound system!

As we all know, times have changed. Today's sleek flat-panel TVs can mount on a wall and go anywhere – even above the fireplace with no room-focal redesign needed! And the soundbar didn't exist years ago, which offers a sleeker, slimmer approach to better sound from the TV. But if you have such a setup in your family or living room, does that make it your media room? If that’s what you want to call it, we won’t argue with you. But we will suggest that a media room installation is more than a TV and a soundbar.

Read on below to see how you can create a media entertainment hub in your family room, basement rec room, or whatever space you choose in your Chicago, IL home.

How to Think About the Design of Your Next Media Room

What’s a media room? Some people might say it’s also a home theater, and it can be that, too. A home theater tends to be a room tailored for longer-form content like films, while a media room might double as a family room, living room, or recreational space.

While you shouldn’t be concerned about calling your media space the home theater, media room, or anything else, thinking about how you will use it will guide you to make the right choices to create the ideal media room installation that fits your Chicago, IL home.

Ready to learn more? Let’s dig into some critical questions and considerations.