Sometimes acoustics and aesthetics appear mutually exclusive. Architects can be guilty of designing spaces with their eyes, not their ears. The reverberance in warehouses and atriums offer two examples of this. Minimalist, glass-filled spaces with shiny, hard surfaces are aesthetically pleasing. But this often comes with the sacrifice of privacy and noise. Unfortunately, adding physical acoustic treatments may “ruin” the aesthetic of the space. This is particularly problematic when the client has spent a lot of money to achieve a minimalist aesthetic. 

The images below show three such scenarios, including a warehouse which had open ceilings (but required speech privacy), an office atrium with significant reverberation, and a library atrium where sound transference was a problem. As can be seen, adding physical acoustic treatments would ruin the “look”, but sound masking, even when exposed, is unobtrusive.

Warehouse aesthetic

The warehouse pictured above had a problem with speech privacy. Open ceilings meant that speech was audible between the private office, boardroom, and open plan area. As a start-up, the business was on a budget, and had daily confidential meetings.

Enclosing the glass offices would be an expensive task that would also ruin the aesthetics of the space. This would be a disaster for the business because the aesthetics were part of their branding. Fortunately, a Soundmask system solved the problem by ensuring speech privacy and remaining visually unobtrusive.

Internal office atriums

The office space pictured above featured a triple story atrium with open plan office space at its base. Unfortunately between the reverberant glass and the soaring atrium, the noise in the space reduced productivity and would create other problems for workers if left unchecked.

The client received an eye-watering quotation for a physical acoustic solution before seeking an alternative from Soundmask. The Soundmask solution had a considerably more affordable price tag, and would honour both acoustics and aesthetics. Our system introduced a comfortable background sound that made the entire atrium appear quieter.

Library atriums

Atriums in libraries are nothing new. One of our first library installations had a heritage listed internal facade from the 1960s. In the modern Korean library pictured above, quietude was critical for study. Beautiful glass butterflies were flying around a glass atrium framed with plate glass balustrades. Like with the office atrium, the triple story atrium created a very reverberant acoustic environment which amplified every sound.

Soundmask installed a system that reduced the intrusiveness of the reverberation and created a quite environment for library patrons.

Conclusion

Acoustics and aesthetics can often seem to be impossible to reconcile. Fortunately, Soundmask can often provide a cost effective and visually pleasing solution where others fail.