Digital Lives, Analog Walls: Are Buildings Finally Catching Up in 2025?

Context

Life since I was a kid has become increasingly more digitized.

More and more of our lives are being managed online.

Everything from finance to relationships can be carried out on that slab of glass that sits in your pocket.

We have also seen advancements in transport with Tesla's ever increasing accomplishments in self driving vehicle technology and SpaceX's reusable rockets.

But one part of our world that has been slow to technical disruption is the built environment in which we live.

Our buildings are inefficient.

Buildings eat a large percentage of global energy, yet most lack smarts to cut it.

Sure, architectural design itself has evolved, for better or worse, since the second world war due to technological advances in building materials and structural design.

But the physical buildings themselves haven't seen the same level of technological revolution.

Why do our houses still feel the same as they did in 1990?

I’ve always seen buildings as living entities.

They breathe through ventilation, pulse with electrical nervous systems, and shift with the weather—cooling off or battening down as needed.

Neglect them, and they decay, just like us.

They are the background to our lives, an ever-present companion that provides safety and shelter.

But one thing they’ve never done is think.

Yes, we’ve got automation—thermostats hum on, lights flick off when we leave—but is that intelligence? Hardly.

It’s just pre-programmed reflex, not reasoning.

But that is all about to change.

With AI and computing power surging in 2025, we can finally give our buildings a brain and a personality.

Digital twins—virtual replicas synced with real-time data—have already nudged architects toward data-driven workflows.

Now, hook those twins to a large language model AI, and the possibilities are endless.

Possibilities

The biggest win I see is AI’s ability to continuously monitor a building’s environment—inside and out—and adapt on the fly.

We’ve had automated systems for years, sure—thermostats holding steady at 22°C, HVAC units tweaking airflow.

But AI takes this to a whole new plane.

It’s not just reacting; it’s predicting, integrating, and orchestrating every system at once.

Picture this: AI tracks soil moisture for rooftop gardens, adjusting irrigation before plants wilt.

It scans structural beams for micro-cracks, flagging repairs before they’re visible.

It monitors energy use down to the watt, then negotiates with the building next door to buy or sell surplus power—all in real time.

This isn’t just automation with a fancy label; it’s a building that thinks ahead.

With AI steering the ship, the sky’s the limit.

Imagine a smart home synced to your wearable device, detecting stress from your heart rate and tweaking the space to unwind you—softening lights, dialling down noise, or cueing a playlist of ocean waves.

Or picture a workspace that senses you’re sluggish and boosts airflow or shifts desk layouts to spark focus.

It’s not just about comfort; it’s about buildings becoming partners in our digital lives—anticipating our needs before we voice them.

I’ve explored decentralisation’s power before.

Now, picture AI homes easing our overburdened hospitals.

They could monitor low-dependency patients—think sensors tracking heart rates or oxygen levels, pinging doctors if trouble brews.

Reserving centralised hospitals for emergencies and high dependence patients.

It’s comfort for patients and relief for healthcare, all from your living room.

It’s cheaper, cozier, and scalable if privacy holds.

Now, pair this brain with Tesla’s upcoming Optimus robot, and things get wild.

Imagine a hive-mind house with arms and legs—Optimus bots that repair leaky pipes, scrub windows, or even reinforce walls during a storm.

Suddenly, your home doesn’t just think; it acts, upgrading and defending itself like a living organism.

This idea can easily extend to the commercial office or warehouse.

Imagine the building carrying out its own operations and maintenance as required.

A commercial building with a function room could synchronise with the business calendar and plan ahead for large functions taking place on premises.

A warehouse could use Optimus to shift stock overnight, AI planning based on shipping data.

While Amazon already does this to a large extent in their distribution warehouses, further developments in AI and robotics could make this technology more available to all companies.

The Downsides

The idea of AI integrating with buildings is extremely exciting, however just like in other industries the application doesn’t come without its drawbacks.

The biggest worry I have with AI integration is privacy.

Do I want an AI connected to the internet monitoring my health and monitoring me around my own house?

Would governments around the world have access to this data?

If my health insurance provider had access to this data, would I still be covered if the system knew I enjoyed a pizza and beer for dinner or spent my weekend playing Fortnite instead of going out and getting some exercise.

This level of monitoring is also worrying as it opens systems up to hacking, or at minimum the system breaking down.

Will I get locked out of my house due to a malfunction if I go out for the day?

I would normally say that hopefully we are smart enough to build in manual overrides, and yet here we are also removing bank branches and ATM’s and debating whether to abolish physical currency because we have a bank branch in our pocket and we can transact online.

The costs for this level of automation are steep too, especially for retrofitting existing buildings.

Low-income homes might stay technologically dumb, widening gaps.

We do already see this with access to high-speed broadband internet.

One fix for privacy might be keeping AI ‘on-device,’ not cloud-based, to shield privacy.

But that cuts off ties to smart cities—think buildings syncing with traffic grids or power networks.

It’s a trade-off: privacy versus connection.

The same trade off we currently face with our smart phones.

Conclusion

Hooking digital twins to AI doesn’t just upgrade our buildings—it rewrites their role.

They are no longer passive shelters but active collaborators, as intuitive as the devices in our pockets.

Yet, as we rush to give them brains, we’ll need to wrestle with the risks, ethics, privacy, safety and control.

Still, if we get it right, the homes of 2030 won’t just feel different from 1990; they’ll feel alive, thinking alongside us in a world that’s finally fully digital.