Owning a great speaker is always essential, not only to blast out some groovy music at your parties but also for those days when you want to sing along to your favorite tunes at the top of your lungs, in the privacy of your room! Whatever may be the requirement, having a clear, distortion-free, handy, and interactive speaker is necessary. There are a lot of innovative speakers out there in the market, so picking the right one that meets all your needs can be a task, especially since we all tend to have different audio requirements. Hence, we’ve curated a collection of functional, creative, and exciting speaker designs for you! There’s a unique speaker for everyone in here. We hope you can find the one that’s meant for you!
Kintsugi is the art of mending broken ceramics using gold to seal the cracks… but what if the cracks were celebrated as a design detail instead? What if the cracks revealed something even beautiful underneath? The Teno lamp + speaker’s reveal is as poetic as life emerging from behind cracked egg-shells. The lamp-speaker uses a cracked exterior that gently separates into two. As the crack widens, you begin to the signs of life underneath as the lamp below is revealed, shining through the cracks with its life-affirming message of hope… but Teno isn’t just a lamp, it’s a Bluetooth speaker too! Designed to look more artistic and sculpturally beautiful than any lamp or Bluetooth speaker you’ve ever seen, Teno is truly about the beauty within. The outer surface comes in the shape of a hemisphere with a crack running through its center (the crack’s even edge-painted gold for added flair). Separate the two halves of the hemisphere, and a lamp within automatically switches on, creating perhaps one of the most unusually pleasing interactions of all time. Pull the halves further apart, and you switch on the Bluetooth speaker within, allowing your light to come to life with sound too!
This new Dieter Rams-inspired Bluetooth speaker design encourages you to click the lock button and stow the phone away if only for a song. The design’s concept is visually approachable and inviting, with a single speaker on the product design’s right-hand side, a roomier pocket for your phone on the left, and self-explanatory player controls on top. While the visual and compartmental design makes the music device easily portable, it also motivates you to end the constant scrolling and just enjoy the music. Since the speaker works with Bluetooth, the space to stow away your phone is more of a light suggestion than a prerequisite for operation. However, if you do decide to use the suggested space for your phone, the product’s design becomes user-adjustable. Since the speaker’s screen, which encases your phone, is transparent, that means you can transform your screen into a compact cassette or any other background, invoking your favorite musical memory within any room.
The motive for Ben Lorimore’s Sound Tool was to have a speaker whose operation relies upon physical intuition, leading it to be emotionally stimulating! The main source of inspiration comes from the eccentric movement of a Conductor; as the volume of the orchestra increases, as too does the Conductors physical presence. This has been beautifully translated into Sound Tool by encouraging the user to increase the volume of the music by grabbing each end of the speaker and pulling them apart! To increase the volume of Sound Tool, grab it and make it bigger. To decrease the volume, compress it. Fully collapse it to pause, Sound Tool will not play at 0% volume. It’s welcoming to see a product that encourages tangible interactions!
You’ve heard of 2.1 audio, 5.1 audio, even perhaps 7.1 audio… but have you ever heard of 12.1 surround sound? That’s what the Actinia speaker is about. Inspired by the tree-shaped sea anemone, the Actinia Speaker has 12 tweeters on its radially symmetric top, and a woofer right at the base. With a gradient-tinted glass body, the Actinia is virtually see-through, bringing an element of transparency to the uniquely shaped organic speaker body, almost reminiscent of how curvy Harman Kardon’s Soundsticks were, back in the day. I don’t imagine the Actinia has smart-speaker abilities, but with 12.1 audio, I doubt you’d really choose to hear Alexa’s voice over some good old, immersive Hans Zimmer or Ramin Djawadi soundtracks… am I right?
A relatively small, hockey-puck-sized gizmo, Humbird has the ability to transform surfaces into speakers. Place it on a coffee table and the table begins to transmit audio, creating a rich sound that you can hear all around your room. Attach it to the body of your acoustic guitar and you’re treated to a different, more airy sound, thanks to the guitar’s hollow acoustic-resonation box. The speaker doesn’t transmit sound waves through the air, but rather relies on a vibrating unit that delivers sound via vibrations through an external medium. It’s easy to be fooled by Humbird’s incredibly small size, but the truth is that the Humbird’s sound is as big as the object you rest it against. Just by simple contact, you can turn entire dining tables, doors, or window-panels into vibrating speaker units that emanate sound through the room.
These sleek and futuristic headphones have a hidden secret – they transform into a speaker! Usually, once you’re done listening to your favorite tunes, you simply place your headphones on your desk or any other preferred spot, however, Helix’s soft headband and ball joint arm, allow you to easily twist and mold the headphones, enabling them to transform into a spiral-shaped speaker. In their speaker form, the headphones also look like a cool little sculpture, something you can place in your room, and are sure to be asked questions about! The headphones come amped with an accessible dial that allows you to control the volume, and change the songs, by lightly adjusting the dial. The dial also works perfectly when Helix is in its speaker form.
Crafted from a mixture of rough concrete and wood, Hevi is a 360-degree modular speaker, with a warm and rustic aesthetic. With a glossy plastic plate stuck right in the middle of it, a surreal modern contrast is created to the otherwise homely materials, which are wood and concrete. What makes Hevi even more interesting is that it dissociates into two speakers! The top portion of Hevi consists of a mid-high frequency speaker, whereas the lower portion is a mid-low frequency speaker. The two can be detached, allowing you to carry either of the speakers wherever you wish. The compact upper speaker is, of course, the more portable option, something you could even carry for your outdoor adventures! When combined, both the speakers create a resounding high-quality sound.
Portable speakers don’t usually have intriguing aesthetics, so Seda was created with the intention of blending both visuals and technology to make it stand out. Its physical form radiates a zen feeling while also having a multifunctional appeal. Seda isn’t just smart, it was made to be intelligent. Seda has a pen holder in the center which also acts as a small space organizer. It features an embedded light bar in its external body which works as a desk light and it also has a dim ambient light – to be honest, this speaker is more lit than the playlist I made for it. It almost looks like an accent interior piece for your home than a portable speaker.
Boasting 360 degrees 3D sound, the BALMUDA Portable Speaker upgrades and amplifies your audio quality! It’s a compact and portable speaker that you can easily carry with you wherever you go. It also provides you with hours of usage, so you don’t have to worry about the speaker dying off, midway through your favorite song! BALMUDA’s unique design enables the sound to travel upwards, rather than horizontally, so it doesn’t matter where you place the speaker, you’ll be able to hear your favorite tunes clearly from any angle or spot. The 77 m full range speaker emits clear and distortion-free audio, even in large spaces!
With a retro name and a personality to match, the Xiaomi Elvis Atomic is adorably small and is styled to look like a miniature memento or trophy, rather than a Bluetooth speaker. Its design pulls inspiration from the turntable and looks like it belongs somewhere in Fallout 76, according to Mike Chua. The tiny yet powerful speaker comes in military olive green and has a speaker grille where vinyl would be. Armed with a simple on/off switch, a knob for volume control, and 7 hours of playback, this CES Innovation Award winner is cute, capable, and memorable all wrapped into one package!