Are Observatories The New Must-Have?

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed)
Oct 5th 2007 at 7:03PM

Now here's a trend in luxury home design that I really get: observatories. For some people a beautiful view of the stars is becoming just as important (if not more so) than a view of the ocean or the beach. And thanks to technology observatories are more fun in places they never used to be, and people are putting them in as additions to their home and taking up astronomy as a regular hobby. But they aren't cheap, obviously, because in addition to the space involved the telescope alone can cost several hundred thousand dollars.

I would love to have an observatory in my home! Forget waiting for the weatherman to say there's a certain star or planet that might be visible at 3am on a random Monday, I'll just pop upstairs and see the stars whenever the mood strikes.

Tags: astronomy, home, homes, observatories, observatory, space, stars, telescope, telescopes, trend, trends

Filed under: Gadgets

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

artifex Oct 5th 2007 11:53PM

You're going to have to contend with light pollution if your house is in any big city.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution#Effect_on_astronomy

Also, no matter what you spend, you're not going to see objects that are below your horizon :)

As an alternative, you might build a planetarium instead.

danny Oct 6th 2007 1:29AM

I want one.

In fact I wish I had the place for more than one! (different latitudes = different views!)

Not to mention that for those of us who love stargazing at all hours of the night, the ability to do it in pajamas in the dead of winter is quite appealing! How cool is that?

As far as a planetarium is concerned it may be for some, but I prefer the real thing enough that I would just put this huge indoor telescope somewhere light pollution was not an issue...