A former pro athlete creates the perfect field for his growing family’s dreams.

In the world of baseball, shortstop is considered one of the most difficult and demanding infield positions—requiring equal measures of agility, range and strength.

So it comes as no surprise that former Red Sox shortstop Royce Clayton would apply similar skills to any post-sports endeavors.

When Royce began making plans to build his dream home in Arizona’s scenic Paradise Valley, he did just that.

Creative collaboration produces a home theater that’s truly life-enhancing.

Can home-theater technology help alleviate the chaos of modern life?

It’s not the typical path-to-enlightenment story, to be sure. But it’s one that rings true to Stephen and Kelli Brown of Austin, Texas.

In downtown Chicago, one family’s home theater brings life to the term “mixed media.”

When the family of one well-known TV broadcaster returned to Chicago, the city they loved most, it was inevitable that their new digs include a state-of-the-art media room.

Working together with Jeffrey Smith of First Impressions Theme Theatres of South Miami, Fla., the husband and wife envisioned creating a venue for home entertainment that is as animated, theatrical and multifaceted as the city itself.

Building a home theater out of thin air requires both adaptation and flexibility.

When a hip, young Los Angeles real estate developer/entrepreneur decided to add a home theater to his Los Angeles-area home, he knew exactly what he wanted—right down to the color scheme and seating configuration.

How to incorporate the theater into his existing home, however, was another question.

Technology and texture unite to foster one growing family’s togetherness.

“The eyes want to collaborate with other senses,” writes Finnish architect and theorist Juhani Pallasmaa. “All the senses, including vision, can be regarded as extensions of the sense of touch … They define the interface between the skin and the environment.”

Custom homebuilder and homeowner John Cioe would no doubt agree with Pallasmaa’s view—particularly since his own family’s comfortable Scottsdale, Ariz., haven is a testament to the importance of sensorial experience to matters of design.

Devout modernists know that perfect form doesn’t merely follow function. It’s function boiled down, stripped bare, magnified and then—this is crucial—honored. Or as Frank Lloyd Wright put it, “Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union.”

When the Gorman Richardson design team was invited to build a state-of-the-art theater for a customer, they faced a major challenge. Their world-traveler clients envisioned a screening room that would feel like their own private harem, a place where they could “escape into a fanciful world.”

“We planned to do a traditional theater with stacks of seats,” the owner recalls. “Then my wife and I decided against that.” Instead, they imagined a room that did not resemble a theater—a small, intimate space that comfortably seats four to six guests.