d&b taps into fashion
Located at the heart of Milan's fashion district, the new Spazio Gessi is a showroom and meeting centre like no other. With world class Italian brands all around it, Spazio Gessi has literally been dug in underground between two historical mansion houses on Via Manzoni. The concept of showroom and meeting centre is itself revolutionary, but revolution is nothing new to Gessi. Home to the design and manufacture of what the company calls, 'bathroom solutions,' Gessi's interior designs might more readily be termed high art. The company has built a world class reputation for innovation, style, and the successful marriage of commercial enterprise and great design; skills they readily impart through their acclaimed Academy Gessi seminar program.
"The project was to create a space destined to be much more than a traditional showroom," said architect Luca Bresciani. "So when it came to thinking about sound and how to relay information we knew we would need a system capable to offer a natural and smooth reproduction of speech and background music, but at the same time ready to bring out the energy for party and events we are planning to host in our space." That said, Gessi are masters of elegance and the muted understatement of style, so this would require discretion. "Of course, we need these features in the smallest possible package, because everything had to be hidden behind the walls boiseires."
Bresciani approached Molpass, arguably the leading audio consultants in Italy, "We had worked for Gessi before," began Alessandro Bertoni a Molpass executive. "We designed and installed a d&b T-Series for the company HQ in Vercelli. Such a system is much like Gessi itself, elegant in design, yet underneath d&b systems portray the highest standards of quality and reproduction, so I turned immediately to their catalogue for this project. The space, some five thousand square metres in total, will host fashion shows, business conferences, corporate dinners, even gala concert events, so the sound solution needed to fulfil many varied needs yet not compromise Luca Bresciani's exquisite interior."
Bertoni's solution focussed primarily upon the d&b White range. "Alessandro showed us the tiny 4S and 5S," continued Bresciani. "After having listened to them, together with a 12S subwoofer, we agreed that those boxes had the aesthetic appearance we needed, and the sound reproduction was perfect." Bertoni, recognising the need to maintain that aesthetic, conceived a signal management infrastructure based on the d&b R1 Remote control software to minimise the need to ever bring in additional sound reinforcement, even for DJ events. "For the main system in the central event area we specified two arrays of Ti10 supported by 27S-SUBs, ideal for this environment; imagine every surface tends to be marble or other similarly dense flat reflective surfaces, the pattern control of the Ti10 was ideal, while the inherent cardioid nature of the 27S subwoofer provides power without mass in precisely the right area. Perfect."
The system was installed earlier this year, with a grand opening in the spring; company founder Gianluca Gessi was delighted, "Our new Milano centre is in many ways a concept laboratory. Here creative people and commercial enterprise will merge together in the emotional sensory environment we have created. To achieve such an environment every detail had to be carefully designed, especially for the most subtle of senses: hearing."
