The inspiration for our speaker design and approach has been heavily influenced by modern hifi speaker system builders such as Friendly Pressure and Devon Ojas. The approach has pushed us as a group to edelve into the analysis of various components and the why in construction to achieve high fidelity sound. Instagram has played a large role in our exposure to speakers as sculptural works, such as Jacob Egeberg’s work displayed below.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C373A-vrROK/

Shivas Howard Brown has been refurbishing and making hifi systems for friendly pressure. His style is aesthetically pleasing, yet remains true to design from the 1970s.

The article describes his relatively new relationship to bulding speaker systems and his 6 month long struggle with designing crossovers and other components.

Friendly Pressure – New Age Speaker Design from London

For the Collaborating Module Submission, I am working with Saia Dugan and Matthew McConnway to develop a speaker that acts as a sculptural representation of a given space. The design of the shape of the speaker will be distorted through data generated by an impulse response of a room. We are currently planning on constructing a cavity that supports the speaker cones and amplifiers, with an outer chassis made of plywood that has been cut by a CNC router to make the shape we generate.

In a discussion as a group, we emphasized the importance of space in our design and we have been continuously referencing a quote from Steven Connor which says ‘wherever a sound occurred, it was always manifested elsewhere, or other things were manifested through it. A sound has no autonomy but is always relational’.

We are collaborating with Matt’s brother who is a mechanical engineer, and he will help us splice the final shape to create plans we can use for the CNC machine when cutting the piece for the outer chassis.

This past weekend, on Sunday the 28th of April, we gathered recordings, impulse responses, and a sine tone sweep at different locations in Central London. Starting in the lower level of the Westminster, we used a stereo Sennheiser Microphone and recorded a series of clapping as well as multiple sine tone sweeps in order to determine the acoustics of the space.

For the design of the speaker we are planning on using Blender to create a 3d model has been distorted by the impulse responses we collected at Westminster station. The shape will begin as a cuboid or an ellipsoid depending on what is possible with the CNC machine, and the pieces will be divided into 25 separate layers to construct a cabinet that is roughtly 45cm in height, with 18mm plywood. After processing the shape we are planning on constructing a miniature model using a laser cutter and 3mm plywood in order to test how to join the layers and support the structure of the speaker given the size of the center cavity.

I have been researching and creating sculptural works reflective of perception and space alongside sound, and the speaker is acting as a sculptural representation of a specific space. The model is fabricated to act as a visual representation of a corridor in Westminster tube staiton, and it calls into question how sound can be visualized. I also think about materiality in sound as it relates to this design, because sound is going to be used as a medium in constructing this speaker cabinet.

Saia, has been experimenting with speaker construction and acoustic design as it relates to the build of a speaker, whereas Matthew has been researching and experimenting with acoustic design with impulse response, and acoustic treatment in space. Saia’s experimentation with speaker design has been closely related to customization alongside specific environments and uses, which has contributed to this idea. We are going to use recycled speakers found by Saia, and an external amplifier.

Here are intial design notes from a meeting we had at the end of April, and a list of rough dimensions for the final fabrication.