New York Metro · Manhattan, New York
Smart Home, Lighting & AV in Manhattan.
Prewar co-ops, downtown lofts, and new glass towers, each with a board, an alteration agreement, and a window of hours in which anything can happen. Manhattan asks for a design that fits the building.
Manhattan, Specifically
The Building Sets the Terms.
Manhattan's finest apartments sit in buildings that were finished before anyone imagined a network closet: plaster on lath, steel beams, and poured-concrete floors with no void to pull a cable through. The board, not the owner, decides who may work in the building, on which days, and with what insurance.
Our work here starts with the alteration agreement and the drawings the building's architect will review, and only then with the equipment. The problems we are called in to fix are usually the result of the opposite order: a system designed for a house and forced into an apartment.
01 · The Board
A Package the Building Can Approve
Co-op and condo alteration agreements name the licensed trades, the insurance that covers the building, and the hours, often 9 to 5 on weekdays, sometimes with a seasonal ban on noisy work. We produce the technology drawings and documents in that package and keep to the schedule it sets.
02 · Prewar
Walls That Stay Closed
In a prewar apartment the plaster, the steel, and the concrete floor make every new run expensive. We use Lutron's wireless keypads and dimmers in the existing boxes, Ketra lamps in the existing fixtures, and battery or single-drop motorized shades, and we check the panel before adding a single load.
03 · Landmarks
Inside Is Yours, Outside Is Theirs
In a landmarked building, interior work that needs no Buildings permit is outside the Landmarks Commission's reach; anything that touches the facade, from a vent to a camera, is not. We keep the system inside the envelope and give the architect what a filing needs when it cannot.
At a Glance
Manhattan in brief.
- Landmarks
- More than 38,000 landmark properties in New York City, most of them in 157 historic districts, plus 1,470 individual landmarks and 125 interior landmarks. A Landmarks permit is required for any work that affects a landmarked building's exterior, and for interior work that needs a Department of Buildings permit or touches an interior landmark.
- Alteration agreements
- Co-op boards commonly require an architect's plans before work begins, NYC-licensed electrical, plumbing, and HVAC trades, and contractor hours such as 9 AM to 5 PM on weekdays, with seasonal limits on noisy work in some buildings.
- Prewar construction
- Prewar apartments typically have plaster-and-lath walls, steel beams, and poured-concrete subfloors; older buildings often still carry 60- to 80-amp service and original wiring, so a panel upgrade can come before new lighting-control loads.
- Market
- Median sale price of $1,250,000 in the second quarter of 2026, a record; the entry to the top ten percent of sales was $4,430,000 in the first quarter of 2026 (Douglas Elliman / Miller Samuel).
- Flood zones
- Lower Manhattan's waterfront, including Tribeca, the Seaport, and Battery Park City, is mapped as high flood and evacuation risk. In Hurricane Sandy the surge reached 13.88 feet at the Battery and Lower Manhattan below 39th Street lost power, which is why we keep equipment above the cellar and plan battery backup downtown.
- Internet
- Verizon Fios fiber and Spectrum are the two wired providers in most of Manhattan, and availability varies building by building, so we confirm service at the address before designing the network.
Sources: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission, about the Commission; NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission, permit types; SRNY, the NYC alteration agreement process; Gallery KBNY, prewar remodeling; The Real Deal, Manhattan sales report Q2 2026; Miller Samuel, Manhattan sales 1Q 2026; CityRealty, NYC flood zones; NBC News, Superstorm Sandy surge at the Battery; The Tribeca Trib, Lower Manhattan after Sandy; Allconnect, internet providers in Manhattan.
Reading for Manhattan
Guides and work nearby.
- Tribeca Penthouse, 2024 →
Lutron HomeWorks QSX with Ketra tunable white, Crestron 4-Series, a custom theater with Kaleidescape, and a UniFi Enterprise network.
- The board approval paperwork, explained →
What the alteration agreement asks for, and who produces each piece.
- Automation in a prewar apartment →
- Motorized shades and the board's rules →
- AV and lighting in a Central Park West co-op →
- Technology for a Park Avenue penthouse →
- What home automation costs in New York →
- A Kaleidescape cinema in a Manhattan penthouse →
What We Install and Service
Every System. One Keypad.
Lighting & Shades
Lutron HomeWorks, Ketra and Rania light, Palladiom keypads, and shades that disappear into the ceiling.
Lighting →Whole-Home Control
Crestron and Lutron on one set of keypads and touchscreens, programmed the same way in every house you own.
Residential →Cinema & Music
Dedicated theaters, media rooms, and music in every room without a speaker in sight.
Residential →Network
Enterprise Wi-Fi and fiber sized for a large house, guest houses, and the far end of the lawn.
Networking →Security & Gate
Cameras, access control, gate intercom, and an alarm that a UL-listed central station answers.
Security →Outdoors
Landscape lighting and outdoor sound on one buried infrastructure, on the same keypad as the house.
Outdoor →Upgrades
Older Crestron and Lutron systems brought current, reusing the wiring already in the walls wherever possible.
Upgrade paths →Support
Monitoring, remote fixes, and priority response under one plan.
Cave Watch →Questions From Manhattan
Manhattan, Answered
Who installs Lutron and Crestron systems in Manhattan apartments?+–
Cave Group does. We are a Crestron Elite Gold Partner and Lutron Gold Dealer with an office in Long Island City, across the East River, and our Manhattan work includes a Tribeca penthouse completed in 2024 with Lutron HomeWorks QSX, Ketra tunable white, Crestron 4-Series control, a custom theater with Kaleidescape, and a UniFi Enterprise network, as well as the lighting, control, and audio at Casa Cipriani in Lower Manhattan.
Can you get lighting control and shades approved by a co-op board?+–
Yes, and the paperwork comes first. The building's alteration agreement names the licensed trades, the insurance that must cover the building, and the hours in which work may happen. We produce the technology drawings and the contractor documents the board's architect reviews, and we schedule inside the hours the building allows. Because a wireless Lutron system lives in the existing boxes and the processor sits in a closet, the scope the board reviews is small.
Does a prewar apartment need rewiring for a smart home?+–
Not necessarily. Lutron's wireless dimmers and keypads replace the switches already in the walls, Ketra lamps fit the existing fixtures, and motorized shades run on battery or on one low-voltage drop, so the plaster can stay closed. What we check first is the apartment's electrical service, because prewar buildings often carry 60- to 80-amp service that a renovation may need to upgrade before new loads are added.
Do you work in landmarked buildings?+–
Yes. The Landmarks Preservation Commission regulates the exterior of a landmarked building and interior work only when it needs a Department of Buildings permit or touches a designated interior landmark, so most of what we do inside an apartment is outside its reach. When something must touch the facade, a through-wall vent, an exterior camera, or a window change, we give your architect what the Landmarks filing needs and design around the answer.
Which internet providers serve Manhattan?+–
Verizon Fios fiber and Spectrum serve most of the borough, but what reaches a particular building varies block by block and often building by building. We confirm service at the address before we design the network, and where the building allows two connections we set them up with automatic failover so a single outage does not take the apartment offline.
Start Here
Walk the Home With Us.
Bring the drawings if it is on paper, or the list of what no longer works if it is built. We will tell you what we would do, in what order, what it would take, and what the board will want to see.
Start a Projector call · +1 (888) 712-2283 · [email protected]