John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hey Guys,
Im currently planning the layout for my studio which is approx 16m, 5.5 metres.
I have planned on equal live and control room sizes and was hoping to incoprotate a smaller iso booth for vocals and a machine room for cable management and ideally some storage.

I am currently landing on this rough layout and was wondering does anyone have any ideas?


The advantage I would imagine is a large enough machine room for a modest enough setup so I could store some extra guitars or mics that are not in use. Also this setup might add another layer of drywall and insulation between the live room(drum kits) and my control room position. So the musician would go from the control room through the booth into the live room.

I would imagine that very low frequencies would still "see" the larger layout as it is only drywall and 100/150 mil insulation. Or acoustically would I be better off giving my control room the full 7.7m length.

Also maybe I could make the walls between the control room and the two "booths" thick and turn them into deep absorbers while I am at it.

EDIT: The machine room is the room below the booth. Probably obvious but not as indicated.

this might be a better layout. get rid of the interior wall, level off the concrete flooring. build the sloped interior but cap it at around 3.2m so it's mostly flat along the direction of the CR viewing.

Hey Glenn,
Thanks a million for taking the time to do that.

That layout is great in the sense that it creates 4 doors between the live room and control room and gives a sizeable booth. The storage and iso room at the back of the live room is also a great idea. However with those I have two narrow openings as shown below that I was hoping to keep as windows as there is a forest outside them and it might a bit of a nice vibe to the live room. One of them is closed over in the picture but they are actually the same size.

I certainly would not keep them at the cost of functionality though so its not a huge probem. I could probably reverse the layout of that room also and keep the smaller rooms at the control room side.

My bigger concern would be the control room size and if I am shrinking it down too much. I had always wanted a larger control room as most of the time I am working by myself whether it be remote mixing, editing, guitar sessions or composing so I definitely do not have clients in every day. I would just be wondering by the time I put a couch and a small unit for tea and coffee would it be tight? And acoustically would it be too small?

Thanks again, great idea.

D

the idea was to create a 1:1.6:1.9 (approx) control room sized based on the width and average height you could build to internally. the skylights in the ceiling should be a problem for the control room but flipping the overall design to accommodate them in the live room would work. i wouldn't shrink the control room. bit i would angle the live room - iso booth wall to reduce flutter in the iso booth and help a bit in the live room as well.

EDIT*

Wrong Dimensions, my shell is 14.4m x 5.5m.

But having measured out the dimensions in my house extension it is more than enough space to do your plan Glenn. I will just need to adjust some dimensions to make up the difference.

no worries, you could just assume that once you add the interior walls etc that you'll be pretty close regardless. i'd just take the 1.6m from the live room - reduce the iso booth depth and angle the wall - probably a better ratio anyways. i'd angle the wall on the LR side so the air lock is better and machine room smaller - you can always use an air lock for more isolation rooms if needed.

My Dimensions would actually be as shown!

The guide lines would be 111m deep studs (including drywall) 150mm off the main structure

gullfo wrote:no worries, you could just assume that once you add the interior walls etc that you'll be pretty close regardless. i'd just take the 1.6m from the live room - reduce the iso booth depth and angle the wall - probably a better ratio anyways. i'd angle the wall on the LR side so the air lock is better and machine room smaller - you can always use an air lock for more isolation rooms if needed.

Sorry just seen this.

Ill have a look into those angles and see what I can work out. I was presuming it would be a good idea to build in some sourrounding bass traps in front of my mix position and as I am not going to go with windows I may somehow still be able to make that work with the iso booth and machine room doors.

Cheers

maybe something like this:

My god glenn,
That is extremely generous. Thanks so much for this. Let me mull this over for a bit!

so if you take the same principles as discussed before - adjust for new dimensions - move the storage adjacent to the iso room and perhaps along that same wall - cabinets etc. this will leave the openings for windows.

That looks great Glenn thanks for that!
I take it the angles in there would be fabric traps? Or am I reading that wrong?

And as I am unsure as to the wall construction in that sketchup, should I leave an air gap between all those rooms? I had intended on doing a fabric-insulation-plasterboard-airgap between each room. (and the external walls)

you could angle the walls as in the original plan or use angled treatments on the walls. the straight walls might be easier to construct but the iso booth might benefit from the angle between the 2 large windows.

gullfo wrote:so if you take the same principles as discussed before - adjust for new dimensions - move the storage adjacent to the iso room and perhaps along that same wall - cabinets etc. this will leave the openings for windows.

Looks excellent, Glenn

gullfo wrote:so if you take the same principles as discussed before - adjust for new dimensions - move the storage adjacent to the iso room and perhaps along that same wall - cabinets etc. this will leave the openings for windows.

Glenn do you mind breaking down the schematic of one of the walls on this drawing? Im just putting in the framing in sketch-up to do a quantity analysis and was unsure what the different layers represented, drywall, stud etc.

I was hoping to do inside out walls in all rooms and start livening it up from there.

A few questions for anyone who can help out.

1. In a design like this with separate stud walls for every room, Can I still construct it with one door between each area? So one door into the airlock, and another into the live room, and just one door from the airlock into the ISO etc. I will still end up with door doors between every area obviously but just in terms of building the door frame across both studs. Obviously one door into the machine room

2. If I do an inside out wall with double layers of plasterboard facing the exterior walls, is ts advisable to put insulation between the plasterboard and the exterior? And If so does that mean I need a vapor barrier between the insulation and the exterior wall or am I asking for moisture problems.