PHOTOS: Lost Spirits Technology's surprising new liquor mission.

Step onto the property at Lost Spirits Technology and the sense that something unique is going on arrives quickly. 

As I wrote in this week's cover story, "Spiritual Awakening: Lost Spirits Technology invents a new way to make superb liquor quicker":

It enjoys three stories (including an off-limits attic where secret experiments happen), a big pool (with a 1-meter diving board) and a tennis court (with a glass-backboard basketball hoop).

The four-car garage currently holds the second and third Targeted Hyper-Esterification Aging (THEA) reactors ever made.

On a recent visit, so-called Swami of Electrical Engineering Eric Dunham and Techmaster 3000 James Haruta were arranging one that looked like a glowing space pod the size of a skinny coffin.

A customized voice welcomes guests at the front door, reminds residents of the time on the East and West Coast, and pumps sound to rooms of the house on command.

Those include descriptions of artifacts scattered about, like the ancient megalodon tooth and model ship Napoleon. (More on those in a minute.)

In the kitchen, padded briefcases carry decades-old spirits for analysis and comparison. E

lsewhere jars and bottles of dark liquor with Sharpie-scrawled tags occupy countertops and shelves.

A slinky dragon chandelier [Lost Spirits co-founder] Bryan Davis created purely from wire and tape hangs from the ceiling in the entryway.

He assembled it because he needed something to do for several days while making sure his prototype reactor’s test run didn’t explode.

But amid all the curation and creativity, it’s the guest bathroom Davis calls “the masterpiece.”

Enter the loo and a familiar voice, which the team calls Tessa, pipes up.

“Welcome to the waste depository,” it says. “Don’t forget to wash your hands and close the door upon exiting.”

After the soothing voice comes music, familiar and powerful. It’s Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture,” underlaid with cannons.

Behind the cheeky programming lies careful calculation: Davis, Dunham and Haruta had to repurpose motion sensors, their Sonos home speaker system, iTunes and Apple Voice to do things they weren’t intended to.

“Two pieces of hardware and two pieces of software hacked and woven into coherent activity,” Davis says. “It’s flawless, the most perfectly executed aspect of the house.”

That is saying something, as it’s only one of a parade of hacks that demonstrate how much can be learned from simple Internet searches.

Learn more with the cover story and the photo slideshow above right.