Bang & Olufsen Beolab 8 is a stunning standalone speaker

The Bang & Olufsen Beolab 8 is much smaller than the other speakers in the prestigious Beolab range – think sculptural objects that form a real focus in a room. Instead, the company has chosen to make its newest standalone speaker a compact affair, allowing it to be as versatile as possible, without compromising the strong aesthetics that define its siblings.

'Drawing inspiration from the high-end Beolab range, our aim for Beolab 8 was to distil the acoustic essence of these impressive speakers into a compact offering,' says Michael Henriksson, B&O's vice president of product marketing. ‘Beolab 8 is a scalable speaker that is all about flexibility, performance, and innovation and fulfils our goal of creating powerful and immersive listening experiences for our customers.'

As with all contemporary Bang & Olufsen equipment, the Beolab 8 has been crafted with longevity in mind. Available with either Danish manufactured wooden lamellas or a fabric front wrapped around a one-piece aluminium body, the speaker has been designed to be updateable (with a replaceable streaming module) and completely repairable, as well as using materials and surfaces that will patinate over time.

It's rare to find a piece of electronic equipment that's been designed with these so-called 'Cradle-to-Cradle' principles, but the fact that the Beolab 8 can combined with older speakers from the company to form a home cinema set-up shows that longevity is very much a core part of how the company does business.

The Beolab 8's portability makes extra-good use of the Room compensation mode, which 'tunes' the speaker depending on where it's placed to optimise the sound distribution. It can even use your phone location to create a special 'acoustic sweet spot' right where you're sitting.

Controls are set beneath a glass-covered interface on the top of the speaker, or you can use the Bang & Olufsen app, and there are four different stand options depending on whether the Beolab 8 will sit on a table or be mounted on a ceiling. A full wireless connectivity suite allows you to stream practically anything through this finely crafted, compact device, and you can also wire it up to existing systems as well.

Beolab 8, available in Silver / Natural Aluminium, Gold Tone or Black Anthracite, with speaker covers in oak, light oak, dark oak, or fabric, £2,199, Bang-Olufsen.com

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Jonathan Bell has written for Wallpaper* magazine since 1999, covering everything from architecture and transport design to books, tech and graphic design. He is now the magazine’s Transport and Technology Editor. Jonathan has written and edited 15 books, including Concept Car Design, 21st Century House, and The New Modern House. He is also the host of Wallpaper’s first podcast.