- Hello and welcome to Ask The Expert. My name is Christopher, and I'm your host. We are at the High End Show in Munich, Germany, and with me today I have Louise. Louise, can you talk a little bit about what it is that you do at Dynaudio? - Yeah of course, I'm the industrial designer together with an entire design team and we kind of focus on the aesthetics of the speaker, so how it looks and how it feels in a room. - So shapes, colors, all that stuff? - Yeah, all that stuff. - Cool, Louise I think we should just jump straight into the first question, and that's from Christopher, and Christopher he asks if we have ever considered doing other limited colors for the Contour besides black and white? - Yeah, I can't answer specifically on the Contour, because it's kind of a secret, but in general we focus a lot about on the finishes and how we choose them and all that stuff - Can you talk a little bit about how you actually go about choosing? - Yeah, of course, we look a lot into trends, and how is the interior design looking and where is that going, because that's kind of an indicator of what would look nice in a speaker, how would it fit into the living room. So, we kind of look into that, do a lot of research in that area, and then we order samples home and see would that work on this specific speaker in that shape and all that stuff - And, is it the same process for choosing, you know, you were talking about shapes now, and is it the same process for shapes and colors? - Yeah yeah, it most definitely is, so some things work on specific speakers as well, so one veneer might look really great on a specific kind of speaker because the cabinet is more rounded, where another one would look better if it's more just a straight surface. - And, I'm a little, you know, the whole design thing, how do you choose, because there's so many colors right? There's so much stuff out there and you said something about following trends, and when I look at a living room in general you kinda also need to choose stuff that goes well with, you know, the rest of the interior, how do you make speakers that have that durability to go with, you know, all sorts of different living rooms? - Well that's why we often have different kind of finishes that we offer, also because it's also very dependent on where you're from in the world - the US might not like the same as China, for instance, so you often also see that in the sales numbers that some specific veneers or finishes are sold better in some regions than others, and then it's more of a personal preference, of course, that what you find pretty in your home, yeah. - But I guess that, you were talking about personal preference and there's also, you know, geographical preference, and we... - Yeah, most definitely. - being Danes, come from an area where we have, you know, a tradition for Scandinavian design, so how do you set that aside and try to figure out what would work in China or the US or in Argentina, or stuff like that? - Well, I won't say we set it aside, because the Danish tradition and this Danish design is very important for the Dynaudio DNA, so we always think that, but in some finishes you might say "Okay maybe this more red veneer would go good in this region?" and that's very much input from the distributors out in China, for instance, and the product managers going out and seeing what is trendy right now in these regions. - Okay, you were also talking about, or we were also talking about, you know, it's also shapes that you have to look at, and Joseph, he asks a question about if we were in the future going to focus more on rounded cabinets? Can you maybe start by talking a little bit about that? - Yeah, of course, we are starting to focus a lot more on the rounded cabinets, and the design team we would really like to just go crazy and make all kinds of shape if we were allowed to, but we also want to maintain a really high quality both in the production and the sound, and right now we are really experts in the boxes and we want to translate the same quality and expertise to these more organic shapes, and that often requires maybe a little more research and new materials and stuff like that, and we want to make sure that it's really good and high quality and we can make the proper finish, so it takes time. So it's a process, and you can see it in new products that we are starting to make more curved cabinets. - Yeah, because it's, you can't just take the same material and make it into eight different shapes, right? - No, right now it's really set on these boxes with the... With the material we are using, so we kind of need to see what we can translate into these more rounded cabinets. - Yeah, composite materials, other types of wood that you might not have used in the past, and I guess that's, again, it's a research process, right? - Yeah, not just for us but the entire project team, so the mechanical engineers especially - You keep them busy, "so guys we found this new material" - Yeah, and we want to make this shape, and we know that that can't be done right now, but do we have a solution maybe? - But that, I think, it sounds like that's also what makes this a fun job right? - Yeah of course, it's really a team effort, so we couldn't do it without the other guys, so we kind of work closely together and when we make a design we go down to the acoustical engineers and ask "Is this even possible to make this sound good?" And if they say no, okay, we have to rethink some things - And I guess coming from a company, the brand that we are, where sound always comes first, it's like no is probably something that you hear once in a while? - Yeah it is, and you just have to work with that, because sometimes it's not just a no it's actually a maybe, so if we just make small changes and just kind of challenge it a bit, you might get allowed to make another shape. - We were talking a little bit about, you know, the whole do we follow trends or is it, do we adhere to some kind of Scandinavian tradition, and it was actually also a question that Matt posted, can you maybe elaborate a little bit on how the Scandinavian tradition is expressed in our products? - Yeah, we are really aware about being honest with the materials, true materials, showing what is that we are actually making the speaker of, and yeah, that is one of the things that is very important for us, and then trying to keep our legacy with taking some components, design components that we have used in the past and kind of modernize it. - So when you have products like the Contour, which has a rich history, a rich legacy, you look back and see is there any shapes, materials, colors that we can bring up to speed, so to speak? - Yeah, if you look at the Contour specifically it's the baffle that really stands out and we have really put in a focus on making it true to the sound, so the shape follows the sound, and that is what really stands out. - To me at least, I would think that there's this constant battle between, you know, adhering to the good old tradition that you have and also wanting to push the envelope a little bit, following trends, how do you figure out when it is time to maybe take a chance, is that just a gut feeling or is there a process for it? - I don't know if there's an actual process for it, sometimes you just have to take a leap and just try to see where it takes you, and sometimes you also propose ideas, so you think okay this could be nice, but then somebody will say "Well that is not the vision for this speaker, so maybe in the future." - Another topic that comes up once in a while, especially when you design high-end hi-fi speakers is this notion of the WAF or the wife acceptance factor. So, can you maybe start by explaining what it is? - Yeah, it's a commonly used term and it explains that, for instance, a speaker needs to stand in a living room where there might be a wife at home. So, to get the acceptance of the wife, you need to make it look pretty and not just sound good, because the wife maybe will choose the speaker depending on how it looks and not on how it sounds. - But I guess that is kind of an archaic way of viewing how people buy speakers, right? - Yeah, because we don't really just want to make the wife love the speaker, we want everybody to love the speaker, it should be everybody would want to place that in their living room, so it is not... - Gender isn't even a factor I guess? - No, not really. - But it's fun, because it's something, it's not fun but it's something that comes up, right, and I think that it's also something that you get challenged a little bit on, I guess? - Yeah, a little bit, because when we try to design the speakers, it can also be said that it's, well you just want it to look like this because you are a woman, but it's, everybody actually wants it to look nice. If you ask them, it's not just about the sound. - I think that one of our colleagues, Melda, once told me that, you know, it's also it's more than just listening, you also listen with your eyes right? - Exactly, it's the first impression, that's actually your eyes, so if you think the speaker looks good, you actually have that already, that yeah this sounds good, so it's kind of a whole package, the experience of the speaker. - I want to transition into something completely different now, because we've got a question from a Facebook user called Mike and he was actually a little bit interested in how do you become an industrial designer, and it's a completely different topic, but I actually think that's quite interesting. Can you talk a little bit about your journey to Dynaudio? - Yeah, of course, I'm been studying at the university in Aalborg where I've been studying Industrial Design, It is a three year Bachelor and a two year Master, then you actually become an industrial design engineer, so it's kind of a combination of where you get these design tools and also the engineering side of it, so you learn about materials and construction and production and all that kind of thing. - And then you just saw a job at Dynaudio and thought yeah why not? - Yeah, actually I did, also because I've always been interested in these kind of technical products, if it's speakers, computers, cameras, whatever, but really found that interesting that type of product. - That's interesting, because I would think that, you know, you said computers, cameras, loudspeakers, to me at least that might just be because I don't know all that much about design, but looking at them they're quite constrained right? There is already a basic formula for, you know, a camera has a certain shape, a loudspeaker has a certain shape, is that a challenge that you like to? - Yeah really much, because when you're kind of constrained you're kind of, it's forced to be more creative, the constraints actually make you more creative because if you have everything in the world you can just design it's actually really difficult because where should you start? Now you have kind of this base point to start from and you can just explore it. - Yeah, and open it up in different ways and say "Okay so yeah we have to work with this, but it needs to look different, or at least I want it to look different." Last question Louise, in your, from your point of view, what is the most important thing about design? - The most important thing? That's a hard question. - I'm putting you on the spot right now. - Well actually the most important thing I think is the user, the end user, the experience of the end user. It doesn't matter if I design something I think is great, because it's all about the end user. What would he want... how does the end user experience this product, how does he see it? Yeah, so. - Brilliant, thank you so much for taking time out of your day Louise to come and join us here at the High End Show. I'm gonna set you free, so to speak, so you can go and experience a little more. And to all of you, thank you for your fantastic questions, keep watching, keep shooting questions our way. See you later!