Unique Home Theater Installation: Racquetball Court Turns into a Home Theater

Anyone who has ever played racquetball knows that it would probably be the worst place to put a home theater system. Hard surfaces from top to bottom would cause the audio projected from loudspeakers to bounce just as wildly as a ball firing off a racquet. Still, nothing is impossible with the help of a skilled and knowledgeable home systems professional.

Homeowner Requests Unusual Home Theater Installation

Ready to swap his racquets for surround-sound and video projection systems, the owner of this drastically renovated space enlisted Henry Clifford from Livewire of Richmond, Va., to spearhead the $350,000 (materials, equipment, construction, and labor) transformation from a regulation racquetball court to dedicated home theater. “I met with the homeowners, stood in that ‘echo chamber,’ and wondered how in the world I would be able to pull this off,” Clifford recalls.

After many discussions between Livewire, the building contractor, and an acoustical engineer, the plan was to slice the room horizontally. The 20-foot-high ceiling would be lowered to about 10 feet. This would create two separate rooms: the bottom serving as the home theater and the top as an art studio.

Hard Racquetball Walls: Softened up with Acoustical Treatments

With the space defined, the next step was softening up the structure with acoustical treatments. Applied to the newly framed walls and ceiling the fabric panels would ensure an enjoyable movie listening experience—free of echo and reverberation. Sound traps positioned at each corner of the room would also contribute to crisp, pristine, three-dimensional audio reproduction.

While the walls were being framed, Livewire specified that cavities to house 11 speakers be constructed. Tucked into these pockets, the Triad speakers could be covered with acoustical wall panels, rendering them completely invisible yet fully audible through the weave of the wall fabric. The front three speakers fire through the acoustically transparent material of a 14-foot diagonal Da-Lite screen and two Triad subwoofers deliver bass from a cabinet beneath the screen.

The Back Court: Packed with A/V Entertainment Options

Livewire paired with screen with a Runco projector, which is slated for a summer upgrade to a JVC 4K BLU-Escent 4K video projector. Because the home theater would be used by not only the homeowners, but their grown children and grandkids, it was important to provide the family with a wide assortment of video options. A rack positioned at the back of the theater holds an Escient movie server, (will be replaced with a Kaleidescape Strato movie server), Blu-ray Disc player, Apple TV, Nintendo Wii, and Xbox 360. “Video gaming has been the biggest draw,” Clifford says.

Simple Control Keeps the Entertainment on Point

Although the room oozes with sophistication and sensational A/V, the gear is remarkably simple to operate.  Livewire programmed a handheld Universal Remote Control remote so that one tap of a button would launch a string of commands to the appropriate pieces of equipment. The homeowners can get the entire room ready for a movie—even dimming the Lutron-controlled lights—by pressing a single button; another button tap puts the home theater to sleep. It’s the icing on the cake in this drastic makeover, and proves that theaters can, in fact, occupy just about any space in a home and function without a hitch.

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