The water closet may never be the same, as Kohler comes up with a way to enhance some of the most used aspects of your home.
If you didn’t think the bathroom was a place that could be enhanced by technology, you might want to adjust those expectations. CES 2021 is kicking off digitally this year, and while we’re not there in person to check out how the throne gets digital, we are seeing an example of how the bathroom can be made a little more modern, with news coming out of Kohler.
You might not know of Kohler, but it’s responsible for taps, baths, toilets, and other bits and pieces found in the kitchen and water closet, and this week, it’s showing us just how the latter of those is changing for the future.
That apparently starts with the toilet, one of the most used things in any home, and Kohler is hoping to revolutionise it with something called the “Innate Intelligent Toilet”, part of a push to make the bathroom a smart bathroom of sorts.
While the idea of an intelligent toilet might have your rear pushing the other way, Kohler’s approach is to include an automatic open and close for the lid, a heated seat, a personal bidet, and a remote. What that remote does, we haven’t found out yet, but our guess is that it’ll trigger those functions to help you stay clean.
Once you’re done, Kohler has a touches bathroom faucet, which is to say it’s a tap that triggers without you having to touch the knob, helping to prevent the spread of germs and bacteria, something that matters more in our world today. Thanks, coronavirus.
That comes off the back of some of the more curious touch-less taps Kohler makes, some of which support Alexa and allow you to talk to a speaker and make it pour one exact cup of water, rather than using a measuring cup. We’re not sure the Kohler Touchless Bathroom Tap has that support — we’re guessing not — but it wouldn’t surprise us if it came from the same research.
Finally, there’s a new type of bathtub, and this one looks to be the most tech savvy of all. While bathing with technology is possibly a recipe for a zap you don’t want to have, the Kohler Stillness Bath has the ability to project light and colour, essential oils aromas, and even fog, essentially transforming the bath into a deluxe spa of sorts. It’s something Kohler says is inspired by Japanese forest bathing — shinrin-yoku — and basically brings it to the home, allowing you to forgo the candles, and let the Stillness Bath do all the work so you don’t have to.
Unfortunately, there’s no word on pricing or release dates in Australia for any of these, but we’ll let you know if any of that changes.
