Do You Care About AESTHETICS? What Are Your Gear/Listening Room Preferences?...


Just wondering about how much people care about the aesthetics related to this hobby.

To what degree do you care, or not, about a speaker looks, an amp, etc? Is it only about the sound, or do you appreciate or require your gear to be attractive to your eye as well?

And more generally, how much do you care about the aesthetics of your listening space?

My answer to both is: I care quite a bit about the look both of my gear and my listening room.

I’ll elaborate on my preferences first.

I just love a beautiful looking piece of gear, especially speakers. I generally prefer a wood finish, and for instance some of the Tidal speaker finishes are drool-worthy to me - any speaker that has a gorgeous rich wood grain with an impeccable finish will stop me in my tracks, especially if it features a graceful or cool design. (I hate a wood finish that has blah color/grain//execution) . I’m also open to other non-wood-finish designs. I spend a fair amount of time on pinterest just looking at beautiful audio gear.  Though for me my current Thiel 2.7 speakers, in one of my favorite wood finishes - ebony - are almost ideal. Sleek, contemporary, beautiful without being garish and...very important....SPEAKER GRILLS!

This is where I depart from many of my audiophile brethren who seem to want to see every bit of technology they paid for, including all the drivers. Although some drivers can be beautiful...most are not (IMO) and so often the screws around the drivers strike me as "industrial" with an unfinished look. The kind of thing you’d never get away with in most other high quality products.

I also don’t like staring at speaker drivers because, for me, it impedes the illusion of soundstaging/imaging/speakers disappearing. If I am seeing the woofer and tweeter right in front of me while the music is playing, I can’t help but perceive them as part of the experience, so I’m conscious of the midrange coming from THAT driver and the highs coming from THOSE tweeters right there! Once the drivers are covered in a nice grill, I don’t perceive the music as coming out of the speakers (if they "disappear" well to begin with).

That general aesthetic carries to the rest of the gear and room. I certainly love some audio jewlery and I’m a tube fan. But ultimately I much prefer a clean, uncluttered visual environment for listening to music (and watching movies). So my amplification/source gear for both my 2 channel and home theater surround speakers is in a separate room down the hall a bit. (If I had to have them in my room, I’d still want to orient them out of my sight when listening to music).

So essentially all I have on view in my listening room is my stereo speakers, and some discretely hidden home theater surround speakers.

Having the preferences I do, I can often find myself somewhat aghast at set ups in which the owner clearly doesn’t care about aesthetics at all "who cares how anything looks? It’s all about the sound!" This can go from set ups (that I’ve also visited) that are the audiophile version of a frat boy’s first apartment, where you think "Ok, I know why you live alone." Wires strung everywhere, speaker grills lying around the floor, just...tons of crap everywhere. I just couldn’t relax in that type of environment.

Then there’s the more studious version, in which the owner clearly cares about aesthetics....they just have a different sense than I do. For instance, those set ups that featuring speakers with a billion exposed drivers, with giant subwoofers (woofers exposed of course) beside each speaker, every bit of amp/source equipment around the speakers, cables prominently displayed...all that stuff to me is the equivalent of being overwhelmed by the technology to a practically intimidating degree.

I like the technology, and I am definitely willing to pay more when I can for a more beautiful, higher class looking product. Speakers especially because they are unavoidable pieces of permanent furnitur, and they can be beautifully crafted. I also love any other gear that’s beautiful and I can always get the aesthetic pleasure of their being in my rack. But I prefer all that to take the back seat to my concentrating on music, hence the clean look for my room. (Which is actually a huge challenge for me to pull off, since I’ve had to integrate both my 2 channel system and home theater system in the same room).

So with my own likes and dislikes laid bare, I’d love to hear others chime in on the same subjects.

Cheers,

Prof






prof
I am waiting for someone to make proper yellow speakers.

When choosing JBL Charge 3+, I opted for camouflage. It is refreshing in some way.

If anyone wants an Apple system, Braun made it some decades ago. It was as good as it looked.

https://www.kulthifi.de/LER2

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/516928863465330701/

https://us.gestalten.com/blogs/journal/the-creative-origins-of-product-designer-dieter-rams

I agree with sound first but if two of the same system component yielded same sound I would pay more for the better looking unit.

i have a kind of frankensystem which I tell myself is together based on sound. But after disliking McIntosh look for so long ( easy to do when they are out of reach) and then getting an MA 5200 at a great deal, I quickly fell in love with the look ( and the sound, and the service) and built my system around it. The meters make the sound better, I swear’
Switched out my Sonus  Fabre Cremona Auditor Ms for my older B&W CDM7SEs after listening to many pairings which really improved sound. SFs 4ohm is maybe just not good fit. And they exactly match the rosewood color of my REL strata III. They contrast nicely with my all black components; the Mc, Project turntable and Denon 3910 CD player. Dedicated listening room so have all my power cords and cables displayed as much as possible. Neat but messy. 
I am going to be a little less judgemental on looks as I go through my next bout of upgraditis given my experience with the Mc. 
I taped a piece of black art paper to the front of my Anthem str amplifier so I wouldn't see the "cool led guages". I know some people like them, but I'm just not the "flashy" type. 'Less is more' for me.

In my living room, I have a 5.1 system with 2 subwoofers,  and all you see is the 2 Persona speakers and TV sitting on a console. My 5 channel amp sits behind the tv as well as 2 power conditioners and other stuff. 6 very low noise fans keeping perfect temps via thermostats.. It's obviously not the best for sound, but I love it. I'm slowly improving it. At most,, you see a couple of green or blue dot of a light through the glass.