There's No Space Like Home

It's Been 44 years since we published Playboy's Penthouse Apartment, a design plan for the ultimate bachelor living quarters. That feature spawned the expression "Playboy pad," a phrase that became synonymous with convenience and luxury for the urban male.

The start of the new millennium seems the opportune moment to map the luxury pad of the future.

To turn the fantasy into reality, we enlisted Syd Mead, the futuristic artist and designer renowned for his design work on such films as Blade Runner and Timecop.

"Luxury implies the ability to secure sybaritic comfort, mobility and access to personal amenities at whim," Mead say. "In the coming millennium, luxury will continue to mean access to the latest accomplishments in transport, information networks and health and longevity techniques. The personal environment will be designed to impress and to complement one's personality and predilections."

Mead's vision for the luxury living space of the future evokes the early 20th century, when the ultimate way to travel was in an opulently furnished private railroad car. He sees the pad of tomorrow as a pressurized, privately owned support module attached to an intergalactic luxury liner. The host ship provides necessities such as local gravity, air exchange, power feed and water, and offers a wide range of services and amenities, including food and beverage catering.

The front entrance is an elaborate geometric bas-relief that recalls the grandeur of Medici palazzo gateways, enhanced in space by a starry view through the atrium ceiling. In addition to these visual components, the unit features multichannel audio with surround sound. Learning-circuit response enables automatic programming of your favorite music. And there's no fiddling with dials and controls, since the system can be voice activated. At the top of the sweeping stairs, a pair of three terabyte computer servers in the communication area run the software that makes the walls and surfaces of the living space a programmable environment. RGB (red-green-blue) signifies the three fundamental electronic coloration channels that have become the standard for devices such as personal computers. With the advent of RGB substrates and coatings, surfaces can be treated as "on" or "off" for various decor style purposes. For a romantic evening among the stars, simply adjust the surface settings on any of the rooms, changing the colors and textures of the walls and the fabric patterns on the furniture to create the desired ambience.

What Mead calls "a private den of liquidity" begins on the main level, which features a central room with a bar and dining area, a lounge that serves as a living room, and a handy nook to fix food (no need for a full-scale kitchen--just ring the mother ship). The walls in the central room, like most others in the unit, are bas-relief crewel murals, soft to the touch and executed in leathers. Dark polished-marble floors lend a sense of masculinity to the overall design motif.

The decorative centerpiece is a two story laminar waterfall behind the bar. Water cascades over faux granite plates that change angle slightly on a random program, shifting the falling water in constantly changing patterns. Atop the waterfall is a 12-foot-diameter RGB display that continually adjusts chroma and intensity, casting an ever-changing light over the central room. This display is part of an elaborate programmable holographic projection system that operates throughout the apartment and is controlled in the communication area at the top of the stairs. The holographic technology, which first came into (concluded on page 248)No Space Like Home(continued from page 192) use in the Seventies as a viewing aid for automobile design (among other things), allows a true three-dimensional presentation without the need for cumbersome two-channel glasses. The image appears to float in full walk-around dimension from any angle tangent to the edge of a 200-degree concave screen.

If entertainment plans call for formal dining, the host ship offers an extensive choice of full-course meals, with delivery and cleanup services provided by ship personnel. For casual dining and everyday eating, there is a food preparation nook tucked behind the waterfall that serves as a complete kitchen. Eight food modules nesting against the wall can be moved by programmable traction sliders to reconfigure into the selected dispensing arrangements. Two of the modules dispense hot and cold hors d'oeuvres, which are stored frozen and then can be flash-thawed when desired. Two other modules dispense hot and cold liquids, including filtered water, soft drinks, coffees and teas. The remaining four modules dispense fruit and crudités, sauces and dips, and, because some male food habits never change, a wide selection of snacks. For late-night noshing, the modules can be sent to the upper level by remote-controlled elevator.

Adjacent to the food area is a two-story, 12-foot-diameter wet-core cylinder that regulates water circulation functions throughout the unit. On this level, the cylinder contains a toilet, the wet functions of the food prep area, sink and disposal, waste chute and a washer and drier.

The walls and ceiling in this area of the unit are holographic display panels that create the illusion of a stylized grove of foliage gently swaying in the breeze. The random silhouettes of leaf and limb serve as a reminder of earth's natural beauty.

In the RGB lounge, directly behind the stairs, pneumatic seating provides an infinite arrangement of shapes and patterns. Programmable electroluminescent fabrics shift in pattern and intensity to suit any mood. A holographic projection screen makes that early 21st century home entertainment center, with its 52-inch digital TV, a quaint memory. Too bad there's no more NFL.

Now on to the upper level. The office area at the top of the stairs is the electronic nexus that brings our pod to life. A marble-topped desk and pneumatic chair that contours to individual postures are there along with a voice-link command system that enables instantaneous interuniversal communication. And when you don't feel like speaking to anyone, you can put all calls on hold with a voice command.

Beyond the office area is the curved perimeter of the spacious bedroom and the upper section of the wet-core cylinder, which houses an environmental chamber. This facility combines the functions of shower, Jacuzzi, steam room, tanning bed and fitness gym. In other words, you'll save a fortune on health club fees. The pneumatic couches, of course, change shape on request to form a chaise or to match the contours of the Jacuzzi. Included are his and her toilets and washstand compartments.

The doorway of the environmental chamber leads into the bedroom and the oversize double queen bed. At each corner of the foot of the bed is an ottoman that slides out at the touch of a button to allow for seating against the softly textured walls. Overhead, an animated RGB tapestry is programmed to play out classic scenes from history. The mirrored surface behind the bed presents moving patterns that duplicate orbital projections of earlier space exploration, and softly-lit mirrored walls along the side of it produce shadowy reflections accented by randomly shifting RGB routines.

While these programmable enhancements combine to produce a stimulating atmosphere, the real delight is derived from a natural source: the awesome sights in space through the window-paned ceiling. Alone, or with someone special, it's easy to relax while contemplating the universe, bringing to mind the mantra of real-estate selection--location, location, location.

Mead's vision for the luxury living space of the future evokes the early 20th century private railroad car.