There’s no shortage of show-stopping design-forward speakers on the market now, from brands like Bang & Olufsen, Sonos and Sennheiser. And yet, there’s something incredibly unique about A For Ara, a new audio brand of handcrafted loudspeakers from Etsy co-founder Robert Kalin and ex-NASA engineer William Cowan.
Ara, which means “altar” in Latin, sets itself apart with a retro aesthetic that’s got plenty of punch to it, no doubt thanks to Cowan’s whimsical approach which is aimed at making A For Ara the focal point of any living space.
The brand’s FS-1 and FS-2 speakers were only recently revealed, shaped as blooming tulips with a functional stem-like funnel column to better focus sound. The FS-1 is the smaller of the two, standing 54-inches tall and it’s a perfect example of A For Area’s attention to detail. The top of the speaker has a circular wooden horn containing the speaker, surrounded by nine panels that look like petals, making it look like no other high-end speaker on the market right now.
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The imaginative, fantastical design should help this boutique home audio manufacturer stand out in the market and give any luxury speaker enthusiasts something a bit more eccentric to add to their homes.
Horn loudspeakers can generally reach great volumes without needing any extra wattage when compared with the more traditional box speakers that are more common on the market. This is mainly due to design given horns usually have a circular steel diaphragm to help them push out more focused directional sound while also reducing distortion. You also get less cabinet resonance and influence from the room, with these A For Ara speakers.
There’s also something incredibly vintage about hardwood horn loudspeakers. This design was much more popular at the turn of the 20th century but isn’t nearly as common as it should be now, making the investment as much about style as it is about function. It’s a solid flex having either the entry-level A For Ara FS-1 speakers, or the thicker and more expensive A For Ara FS-2 speakers, flanking a TV unit or sitting pretty in a dining area.
The design-forward approach also means A For Ara offers either speaker in various colours as well, with customisable horn and base colours so you can either have both match or contrast. Options include black walnut, hard maple and cherry wood species for the horn, and matte, satin or gloss custom lacquer paint jobs for the base.
Behind the design, the audio engineering is just as impressive. The drivers for the high and mid frequencies are both positioned in the throat of the horn so that they can radiate sound from a single point and have naturally amplified by the design. This is compared to a staggered approach for driver positioning, working with the aesthetic to produce a seamless marriage of form and function.
A For Ara’s FS-1 and FS-2 speakers are priced upon inquiry but according to early reports, prices start from around US$5,000 (~AU$7,440). Every speaker is bespoke and handcrafted by a team of five out of A For Ara’s studio in Catskill, New York.
Also in the initial A For Ara collection is the B-2 speaker, which is more blocky than the tulip design but is just as avant-garde in its approach to aesthetics. The horn-loaded dome tweeter that drives the speaker comes accompanied by horn-loaded midrange drivers and a quad of linear 7-inch woofers all packed in a futuristic-looking sealed box.
