Multimedia sideboards
Audiovisual (AV) equipment has become a permanent fixture in today’s homes, so it is logical that specialised AV cabinets have followed suit. The wide range of available designs reflects users’ varied needs and requirements. For example, ZER04ZER03 studio’s ‘System SY11’ by Extendo is an aluminium, modular, open, floor-to-ceiling shelving system, with enough space for a large TV screen, as well as loudspeakers, CD and DVD players, video games consoles, and, of course, the corresponding media collection, as well as books, magazines and decorative objects. In addition, this high-capacity AV cabinet may also be used as a room divider.
A similar design is Kurt Erni’s ‘VaRe’ for team by wellis. Here, the wooden, modular, open shelving is additionally supplied with sliding doors in order to protect and conceal the AV equipment when it is not in use. There are smaller-scale solutions too; take Expormim’s ‘Basic TV module 1 door’ AV cabinet, a low, understated, solid oak sideboard, or Thonet’s
B106, a tubular steel sideboard inspired by Marcel Breuer's classic designs from the 1920s. Morelato’s wooden ‘Credenza Porta TV Zero’ AV cabinet and Ebbe Gehl’s and Søren Nissen’s ‘AK 2720’, a low shelf mounted on slanted legs, resembling a coffee table, recall midcentury design.
Meanwhile, Fritz Haller’s and Paul Schärer’s ‘USM Modular furniture Haller’, manufactured by USM, is a versatile construction kit, combining an exposed steel skeleton with engineered wood infill panels, offering endless possibilities, from AV cabinets to high capacity storage solutions. Bruno Rainaldi’s ‘Ptolomeo TV’ for Opinion Citti is a compact AV cabinet which mounts shelves and a TV screen on a central column.
A different approach is taken by Peter J. Lassen in his ‘Montana TV Hi-Fi Furniture’ for Montana Møbler
, which consists of a wall-mounted sideboard that holds up a screen, with open, different sized compartments framing the composition. And finally, Massimo Castagna’s ‘Smartwall’ AV cabinet, produced by Acerbis
, is a large, wall-mounted cabinet which seamlessly integrates a TV screen, media players, a smartphone docking station, loudspeakers and storage space in order to present a minimal and uncluttered front.
