John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hi everyone!

I'm buying a studio these days. It was built in the late 70's but haven't been used for a while, so I'll have to refurbish most of it.

One of the rooms was intended as a stone room, but the stones where never put up. The room, which is made of concrete, has no parallel walls (the walls are well treated). Floating floors, as in all the other rooms in the complex. Floor and ceiling is concrete. The room is around 20 sqm and the ceiling height is 3m. Would you say that finishing the room as intended is a good idea? Would one get a good sounding stone room with these dimensions? I already have 100sqm of recording rooms (a main room and two booths) so I don't need another "normal" room, but I could maybe build a small editing suite with a vocal booth instead if you guys don't think building a stone room as the one I would be getting is a good idea.

I must say I like the thought of being able to offer a different sounding room. No other studio in town has this so it would make the studio a bit more unique. However, a crappy sounding room is no use of course.

What say you?

Ps: I'll have more info regarding the build soon, but as of now I'm mostly interested in knowing your thoughts about the dimensions in general. If doing this is doable at all.

Christer

Hi Christer, and Welcome!

I guess it all depends on what you'd like your "stone room" to sound like, as compared to what your other rooms sound like. It also depends not just on the stone itself, but how you install the stone. For example, if the stone is mostly regular shaped with flat surfaces, and you installed to make flat walls, it could be very resonant in there, with no diffusion. But if your stone is irregular, and you were to build your walls with very large variations in the levels, such that some pieces stick out while others are deeply depressed, and at random angles and depths, then you could have a room that is bright but diffuse at the same time. If you really wanted to get creative, you could even lay out your stones in the pattern of a QRD or Schroder diffusesr, so it is tuned to a certain frequency range.

Other options would be to do just one or two walls in stone, while doing the others differently, such that there are different "zones" in the room. You could get different acoustics by setting up instruments and mics at different places in the room, closer to or further from the stone. You might even want to have variable acoustic devices in there, so you can also change some aspect of the acoustic response in some places around the room.

In other words, there are many options, with many possible outcomes, depending on how much time and money you want to spend on the design and construction, and what it is that you are looking for. You could, indeed, end up with a very unique sounding room, if you wanted to do that. A 20m2 room with a 3m ceiling and one or two deeply sculpted stone walls plus variable absorption / diffusion could be a paradise for recording drums, for example.

On the other hand, if the rest of the rooms in your facility already offer a good range of acoustic possibilities, then building that "stone room" might be superfluous. no need to re-invent the wheel if you already have a good one...

If you could provide more details of the other rooms, their sizes, purposes, acoustic qualities, etc, as well as some photos of those rooms, the room in question, and the stone itself, that might help us to get a better idea of where you are right now.

- Stuart -

Hi Stuart!

Thanks for answering! Appreciate it a lot.

This is good news indeed. My other rooms are (if kept as they are) more neutral and balanced. The main room has two wooden walls that have thick curtains in front of them so it can be rather dead but also more reflective. The room is well known from when the studio was active back in the day as a very nice live room. However, I don't think it has lot's of character so that's why I'm hoping to get a unique sounding room with this stone room.

I am going to get more information (and pictures) within the next couple of days regarding this, so then I can start planning. I've got John Brandt with me on the project. He will design the control room over again. (the control room has now been turned into beedroms and a hallway. The rest of the studio is kept intact)

Regarding budgets, I'm going to see what can be done with each room but I'll have to do this over a longer period of time as I'll be having lot's of expenses this year just by getting up and running. I want every room to be as good as can be. I'm buying the building itself so this is a long term investment. Will keep you guys in the loop!

Christer