Natural Light Optimization (NLO) is the latest innovation for Lutron Roller shades. Through an algorithm that uses calculated solar positioning, motorized shades move to preset positions automatically throughout the day to give homeowners a comfortable environment that reduces glare, mitigates heat, and maximizes available views.
To discuss NLO technology, the company’s new Recessed Drapery Track, and other motorized shades trends, Sheng Qu, product manager for luxury, residential shades, and Margaret Block, manager of the business development team for motorized shades at Lutron, recently chatted with CE Pro.
SHENG QU: We had a really crowded booth. We launched lots of great lighting innovations and shade innovations. Specifically for shades, there are a few really noteworthy innovations, starting with NLO, or natural light optimization.
This program really simplifies motorized shades; we adjust the shades throughout the day, across the seasons, based on precise solar positioning. We leverage the property’s latitude, longitude, the position where you are on Earth, where the sun is… and we’ve really simplified customizable templates for dealers to adjust.
Dealers can enhance the comfort, protect the furnishing, maybe optimize the view, and also reduce glare. All these things, accessible by touch of a button from a homeowner. It’s really easy for the dealer and this feature will come out in one of the latest upgrades from Lutron HomeWorks, QSX, and RadioRA 3
Lightapalooza took place in late February, and the growth of the event has mirrored the rapid ascension lighting fixtures and controls.
We think drapery is becoming more and more popular, especially with soft treatment being such a popular category, so we continue to innovate, and we announced the Recessed Drapery Track. When you look at the ceiling, you only see the little slot opening, and then the track really moves smoothly.
Lutron’s Recessed Drapery Track for its roller shades addresses designers’ requests for low-profile technology. (Courtesy of Lutron)
Especially the recent trend for a minimalistic and clean ceiling – we call it a ‘quiet ceiling.’ It’s become really popular in a lot of new architecture. Everything started being very smooth with the ceiling. I think this gives dealers another great option to have a beautiful drapery solution.
QU: One focused on talent, architecture, precision story. When you walk in, you see the products that tell the precision story with the technology, how Ketra lighting integrates with the system, and how the shade moves with the lights.
On the other side, we have a retreat area. We’re basically focusing on how lights can enhance human life with the technology. This year we incorporated natural light optimization and we also showed how the shade can move with it, and how lights and shades play altogether to give you a really nice feeling.
QU: We knew our booth is a great place for our integrators to come in and have a great conversation, learn about the new motorized shades products and everything we’ve introduced. We also realized it’s hard to get a deeper look behind the scenes. How do I really adopt this product for real-life applications?
I want to see how everything goes in [to a project] with natural light optimization. Well, there’s four great templates. How do I program this into a system? So in the Lutron Lab, we had engineers give dealers a really good hands-on opportunity to play with the product and listen to an engineer tell about all the great stories about how we develop these things.
QU: We’re focusing on three basic aspects. The first of is we want to make sure we’re delivering the best-in-class technology and integration with our lighting control system. That’s what you see on national light optimization, a great interplay with our lighting control system.
We want to have a lot of great aesthetics and thoughtful design that inspire. That not only played a role in the Recessed Drapery solution, but we also came out with an aged bronze finish for Palladiom, which is a very popular shade in our product category, and now we introduced a pure brass finish.
So that’s the second category, and the third is we’re trying to make the product easy, not only, beautiful to look at but super easy for our integrators to adopt. That’s why you see this year we came up with Triathlon Select, which is great for two types of situations – one is so dealers are not leaving some of the windows uncovered with motorized shades.
Starting at $599 to cover a window is a great solution, but also this gives homeowners and dealers a great opportunity to have a little upfront investment and get into the automated shade board.
MARGARET BLOCK: It’s something that we’re constantly thinking about, because you have folks that have been in the motorized shades category and putting shades in projects for 20 years. So how do you help them be more efficient, be more creative, get on and off projects more quickly when they’re doing some really sophisticated shade installations? We’re focused on that side of it.
But also, it can be an intimidating category to get into. If you’re not familiar with how to talk about fabrics with a client, how to talk about what can be a rather high price point in some cases if you’re covering large windows. How do you broach those subjects with someone that’s pretty new?
Aged bronze finish was added to the style options of the designer-friendly Palladiom shades hardware. (Courtesy of Lutron)
One of the exciting ways we’ve done that this year is with Triathlon Select. It is a really simple shade to understand, has some limited fabric and size options to make it easy, and a price point that’s a little bit more palatable.
Also, we’ve really thought about how shades go into windows from beginning to end, so this product comes with a measuring tool that’s designed almost to have the ends look like the brackets of the shade – you can literally put it in the window to measure.
You can lock it and indicate where the screws need to go for the bracket so that you can take a really accurate bracket-to-bracket measurement with a tape measure – it’s designed to be foolproof. We got a lot of wonderful feedback from people that had never measured and installed a shade that said, ‘Now that I can do,’ so we’re excited to see where this product goes.
BLOCK: Our big focus has really been innovation and quality. How do we make a shade that is truly on the cutting edge of intelligence and performance? But how do we also make sure that when that shade goes in, it continues to operate for years and years and years?
Motorized shades is one of those categories that homeowners don’t expect to have to think about once it’s in. It should be moving where it should. It should be easy to operate. It should be simple or needing absolutely no maintenance.
So it’s really important that once the product is in, it’s in for the lifetime of that product. And we spend a lot of time focused on how the products are built, how the products are designed, how they extend through end of life. All of that really goes into how we differentiate ourselves.
That goes not only from our roller shades that make up a good majority of our product line, but that extends to our drapery tracks, that extends to the finishes that we choose to bring into the categories, and that extends to the fabrics we bring into the collections that we promote.
BLOCK: Well, I think a lot of it comes down to how you position an automated shade in terms of value to the homeowner. There are some really obvious spaces in a home – great rooms, kitchen, maybe primary bedrooms – for automated shades. Tall windows, windows where you can’t reach… an automated shade seems obvious, especially in luxury residences.
But one of the things that we see a lot is not bringing up the concept of automation throughout the home. Having a button at the front of the home that says ‘close all my shades’ or ‘all off’ that turns off the lights, closes the shades, shuts down the home as I’m leaving provides a sense of privacy, security, insulation that can only be achieved when you’ve got automation in all the rooms.
That’s one of the reasons why we’re so excited about Triathlon Select, because at this lower price point, at this simpler product offering, you can talk about motorization across your customer’s entire home, and that’s where that magic of ‘all off’ for your whole home really comes in.
I think the second area is always thinking about how integrators can work with interior designers. This is a design category, it’s an aesthetic, right? So we’re always thinking about, how do you marry the performance of the shade as well as what it looks like, and a great way to do that is by layering.
It’s by having your functional sheer fabric window roller shade on the inside, and then having a beautiful custom drapery over the top, and all of that can come together where the integrator can provide that functionality. The interior designer provides that sense of aesthetics, and together you present a really nice integrated solution.
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