Our Favorite Design Details Of HGTV's 2025 Smart Home

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Since 2008, viewers have been keeping a close eye on the many innovations HGTV's yearly Smart Home would unveil. Sometimes the surprises were room-sized big, while other times it lay in small details. We watched this year's updates as they added a television screen that drops down from the patio ceiling, an automatically-scoring basketball hoop, and smart security systems for all the doors. While the technology was great, so were the non-tech touches, like a backyard fire pit and a functional living room coffee table that featured several nested triangles, ready to be pulled apart for games or entertaining.

Located in San Antonio, this house serves a big "howdy, y'all," to Texas and to casual living with a significant 21st century techie vibe. The classic large bay window with a built-in upholstered bench might have you wondering what makes this house so smart, but as we viewed the kitchen, it hits us. Where the HGTV 2024 Smart Home made a kitchen island feel cozy, the 2025 version is expansive, generously seating four on one side, while hiding the oven and microwave on the other. Its under-island lighting is stunning, but the nifty smart feature is the pop-up charger/outlet post. And the stove's integral burners that are a part of the countertop are both sleek and practical. Yet, despite all those features, they still aren't our top design picks! Read on to discover our favorites and hear more about the HGTV Smart Home 2025.

One of our favorite concepts from the HGTV 2025 Smart Home borders on the nostalgic and whimsical without being too cute. The feature in question? An upper deck that feels like you're lounging in an adults-only treehouse. The beams feel like branches while the trees surrounding the house are close enough to give you the in-canopy feeling. Meanwhile, you're far enough away from nature that big Texas storms won't cause branches to knock on the skylights. And yes, we said skylights. 

One of the fabulous features of this covered outdoor deck is that the peaked roof is brightened by four overhead skylights that both open up and have cooling shades. Also overhead is a ceiling fan to keep breezes wafting on warm southern days. The back of the deck leads into the home from a single door flanked by two tall windows. The front of the deck opens up to the backyard with a full view, from basketball court to fire pit. As for access, a lovely spiral staircase winds down to the lower deck.

Sure, there are stunning treehouses you can rent on Airbnb, including some that are in the 2025 Smart Home's native state Texas, but this deck is like having your very own treehouse. If you aren't the winner of the sweepstakes and opt not to rent a getaway, try your own little taste of treetop ambience with the Ramon Store's 7-foot, LED-lighted eucalyptus tree or even a well-lighted living tree set up in a planter. A few of those on a deck or patio might almost give you a lush, green treehouse experience.

The phrase "if you know, you know" — IYKYK — means that you get the point of something because you've experienced it, too. Having a great, functional mudroom is very much a IYKYK subject for homeowners. You'll know you need a good mudroom when yours is the party house or gathering space, as the HGTV 2025 Smart Home is sure to be. The house is designed to be a place where friends and family gather to have fun, as you can tell from its basketball court, backyard fire pit, and media room. 

With a house like that, it's a sure bet that friends and family will be running in and out all day and night, and they're going to need a place to sit down to put shoes on, take them off, attach a dog's leash, or a myriad of other tasks. Featuring a modern mix of matte black metal and warm wood, the fold-down benches are perfectly placed for whenever you need to sit for a minute. The benches are also in a great spot for setting down a laundry basket since they're directly across from the smart laundry set-up, top-of-the-line appliances that are fast and connected to smartphones.

Having a wall-mounted bench is also one of the great ideas for remodeling a small basement so even if you aren't the winner of the HGTV sweepstakes, you might feel like you've won big if this idea solves a tight space issue in your house. You can get one that is an 18-inch premium folding teak shower seat from the Bootuu Store that has a 400-pound capacity and looks similar to the one in the Smart Home.

The designers of the HGTV 2025 Smart Home wanted the brilliant San Antonio sunshine to stream throughout the house. It didn't hurt that in doing so, they also were incorporating environmental responsibility by minimizing the need to rely on traditional light sources. One glance at the house from the backyard shows skylights seemingly everywhere. There are even skylights over the catwalk that spans the lofty area above the living room and kitchen, connecting the bedrooms and media lounge to the upper deck. The sloped rooflines, including those of the deck, are adorned with the space brighteners, which are sponsored by VELUX.

If you thought skylights over the upper-level deck were notable, you haven't seen the most unique bursts of solar lighting in the HGTV 2025 Smart Home. Pops of natural light appear in the Smart Home's master bathroom and laundry room, emanating a glow in spaces that would most benefit from the extra luminescence. The solar tubular lighting is branded as Sun Tunnels by VELUX and relies on acquiring light at the roof line via a lens, which then travels through the reflective aluminum tube to a diffuser that spreads the light inside the home. They are useful in spaces throughout any home and are one of the clever lighting tips that'll make your small closet feel bigger. Because they can be installed in a lot of different areas of the home and are more affordable than skylights, solar tube lights offer a great alternative to traditional skylights.

Of all the design details to love about the HGTV 2025 Smart Home, it's probably surprising to some people that paint color would make the list. Built in the 1950s, the mid-century modern house was renovated by the HGTV team to become a true showpiece, so even the paint palette was important. As the home's designer Poonam Moore took viewers on a walk through the interior, the camera lens hit the serene kitchen and all we could see were the beautiful cabinets. It felt magnetic! The Sherwin-Williams shade, available at Lowe's, is Underseas, and it's in the same color grouping as the HGTV Home by Sherwin-Williams 2025 color of the year, Quietude.

The hue is a soft greenish shade that plays with blue tones, resulting in an overall sense of calm sophistication, but has just the right hint of vibrancy. It's similar to the Nate Berkus-favored neutral green paint color that's taking over kitchens, but has more blue and less gray, causing it to really pop against the home's black countertops. The Sherwin-Williams shade is less "earthy" than some of the green tones cited among the 8 underrated paint colors that are perfect for your kitchen cabinets, but it still provides an appealing symmetry with the outdoor view through the kitchen's large windows.

Choosing just a few design highlights in the HGTV 2025 Smart Home in San Antonio was a task bigger than Texas, but this ain't our first rodeo, so we saved a few for honorable mention ribbons. Inside the 3,000 square feet of living space, they packed great features, some with technological innovations, like nearly everything in the media lounge, and others with classic attention to detail, like keeping the original fireplace in the dining room and flanking it with built-in bookshelves with custom lighting. Our honorable mentions offered a bit more, however.

The first shout-out goes to the upstairs multipurpose room. More specifically, the honorable mention goes to the desk that converts to a bed.  When this blonde wood frame isn't working as a bed, it slides back into its hiding place inside the wall, transforming into a sturdy desk. It's a new take on the secretive Murphy door trend, aka the perfect way to hide a room in your home. And then there are the skylights that open up to become balconies. That, of course, is our second honorable mention, because, much like a desk that becomes a bed, who doesn't love dual-function design elements and furnishings? 

The third honorable mention goes to the square black marble tile wall that extends from floor to ceiling in the upstairs bathroom. It adds a sleek, yet retro elegance that complements the modern glitzy gold hardware, transforming the master bath into a timeless oasis. Give the fourth award to a feature most people might overlook. Off the back deck on the lower level, just outside the door from the mudroom, the designers added a butcher's block topper to the lower part of the chimney. Forming a spot about the size and height of a bench, it's perfect for lounging, food prep, or a place to rest your drink.