Dezeen promotion: Italian company Nice has launched a system of touchless automated interior blinds that can be tailored to homes, public buildings and commercial spaces.
Nice's Era Inn automation system incorporates roller blinds, Venetian blinds, Roman blinds, pleated blinds and projection screens.
Any of these styles can be programmed to settings that suit the users' personal tastes and environments. The blinds' automation can help to optimise the amount of natural light allowed indoors, improving the buildings' energy efficiency and enhancing inhabitants' comfort.
"Thanks to Nice solutions for blind automation, natural light can be managed in a smart, integrated and easy way, and adjusted according to situations, personal tastes and community needs, for the ultimate wellbeing in any living space," said Nice.
Automation is managed through the user's choice of a range of accessible controllers, or through the Nice apps, which can be used both locally or remotely as part of a connected home.
For manual overrides, Nice offers controllers including Air, a wall-mounted "touchless" transmitter that gives users the ability to raise and lower the blinds with the wave of a hand. Nice suggests it is the ideal system for environments where users need to wear gloves or don't have their hands completely free.
Another control option is Agio, which Nice describes as an "elegant" solution. The transmitter also manages other appliances and lights, incorporating a dimmer function, and comes in three colours with a glossy finish. At night, its keys light up in response to an approaching hand.
The company claims its blind automation systems are "extremely quiet", so their raising and lowering happens without disrupting the work or sleep of building occupants.
Nice was founded in the early 1990s in Oderzo in northern Italy, and specialises in integrated automation solutions across a range of products, including gates, garage doors, road barriers and parking systems, and awnings as well as blinds.
It describes itself as the first company in this field to prioritise design, and among the first to obtain the Apple HomeKit certification, offering full integration for the remote control of garage door automation.
For more information on Nice automation systems, see the Nice website.