Premiere Design

I've seen plenty of horn-based speakers, but nothing like the Vox Olympian from British Living Voice. This magnificent monster is as much sculpture as it is speaker.

The main cabinet houses a 15-inch, paper-cone woofer with a custom-designed suspension within a modified exponential-compound horn that is hand-made of laminated beech wood. Above it is a 3-inch compression driver in an exponential horn, also made of beech.

Proceeding up the frequency spectrum, we come to a 1-inch beryllium-dome compression tweeter at the throat of a modified exponential horn made of cast bronze. At the top is a slot-dispersive compression super-tweeter, also with a beryllium diaphragm.

As with most horn-loaded speakers, the Vox Olympian is extremely sensitive—105dB/W/m to be exact—which means it can play plenty loud with very little amplifier power behind it, making this speaker ideal for single-ended triode amps. Unfortunately, I was unable to glean any other specs, even after repeated attempts to contact the company, though I have little doubt they are truly Olympian.

As you might expect, the price is Olympian as well—£190,000/pair (just under $300,000 as of this writing). That's a lot of dough, but the Vox Olympian should bring the music of the gods to those fortunate few who can afford them.