The following interview was published by StereoLife Poland. 

If we asked audiophiles which element of the stereo system they think is the most important, most would certainly bet on speakers, amplifier or source, or - in the case of the most crazy ones - on such things as cables, power accessories or anti-vibration pads. A large group will answer, however, that the room in which all this apparatus works has the greatest impact on the final sound result. It is impossible to deny them. In a room with poor acoustics, even the most expensive and most refined equipment will not be able to show even some of its capabilities, while in interiors adapted to listen to music, even inexpensive equipment should do well and give us a lot of pleasure. What to do to be in the second group? There are of course many simple home methods to improve acoustics. 

First of all, you can take care of the furniture and other interior design elements, such as carpet, curtains or large, soft sofa. Often, however, this type of treatment is insufficient, and therefore more and more people are choosing the "real" and "target" solution - the installation of professional acoustic systems. There are many companies on the market offering specialized products for adapting room acoustics - not only listening rooms, but also recording studios, concert and conference rooms, office spaces, hotels, restaurants and public facilities. One of them is Vicoustic. The Portuguese have long provided audiophiles, sound engineers and installers with panels that do not look like typical, ugly, gray sponges. Recently, their offer has changed a lot. 

My interlocutor joined Vicoustic in 2017. As he himself explains, he was encouraged to study physics, and specifically acoustics, by ordinary human curiosity. He wanted to understand why certain things work in a certain way, and in the field of acoustics science is naturally connected with art. After completing the course, followed by a master's degree in engineering physics, he began his career as an Acoustic Engineer, managing for almost fifteen years a diverse range of projects in many sectors and regions, from architecture, construction and room acoustics to issues related to environmental, urban, industrial and industrial noise building. During this path, Gustavo became a member of the Institute of Acoustics in Great Britain and the Portuguese Engineering Council Ordem dos Engenheiros, obtaining the title of specialist in the field of acoustic engineering. As he says, joining the crew Vicoustic switched to the other side of the force. 

Earlier in his work, he used various acoustic products and developed custom solutions for the projects he ran, and later he helped himself to develop panels that meet the needs of engineers, architects and designers. He is also responsible for the Vicoustic Academy - an intensive training program in the field of room acoustics, which the Portuguese company runs regularly. 

The standard thinking about acoustic systems is average for people either none or such that they are ugly pieces of sponge, a quarter or wooden trusses, with which even a nice room can be turned into an "audiophile dungeon". 
I would say that this concept is characteristic for the times preceding the establishment of our company. The name Vicoustic comes from the words "Visual Acoustics", which explains virtually everything. From the very beginning, we wanted to provide clients with acoustic panels that not only work, but also look good, preventing the need to transform the listening room into this "audiophile dungeon". However, if someone has such a goal and would like to build something like a dungeon in which you can hide, we offer products that are perfect for this. 

I first heard about Vicoustic in the context of acoustic systems for a recording studio. Later, panels with interesting patterns and even reproductions of paintings appeared. It was already a step towards their civilisation. Today? Seeing panels imitating concrete or clever, colorful "puzzles" that you can arrange at your own discretion, I begin to think that we are already living in another era... 
Yes I agree. We are now living in an age where many different people are beginning to appreciate good acoustics. This means that we need to find answers to various challenges related to the diversity of places where our panels can be installed. As a result, having structures with excellent acoustic properties is no longer sufficient. We need to look at the acoustic panel from a greater distance - understanding that when we place such an element in a room, we need to take into account several features to make the whole room work as planned. For example, it doesn't matter if the panel has excellent acoustic performance if it makes people feel uncomfortable with its design when installed in the room, or if it releases volatile organic compounds (VOC) into the atmosphere, which ultimately worsens the air quality in the room. Nowadays when developing a new product Vicoustic takes a holistic approach and think about acoustic performance, air quality, human safety (fire rated), ecology (use of recyclable materials), design, quality, etc. 

Acoustics are rarely taken into account when building or furnishing a home, apartment, office or even a waiting room in a dental salon. Floors - yes, walls - yes, furniture - yes, lighting - yes, but the sound characteristics of such rooms - no. Is this slowly changing? 
I believe that this is changing and we can see this change in three main areas. One of them is that many countries are implementing or have already implemented the relevant building regulations, introducing mandatory acoustic characteristics of many rooms, such as schools, offices and restaurants. We also have very well defined acoustic guidelines for hi-fi rooms, recording studios, home cinemas, auditoriums, etc. Second, if we look at the design schemes of green buildings, which are increasingly taken into account not only at the stage of construction of new, but also at renovating older ones objects, we see that acoustics is beginning to play an important role. People understood that designing a building just to achieve low energy consumption is not enough, and that's why they started talking about sustainability. This term is often misunderstood. Sustainable development is not only a matter of ecology, but also designing a building that will do its job. For example, imagine a listening room with an excellent audio system whose acoustics do not work, preventing us from capturing all those small details that matter. Let's assume that to cure the acoustics of this room, you need to install acoustic panels that emit volatile organic compounds (VOC), seriously affecting air quality and threatening human health. This type of room cannot be seen as an ecological room because it does not fulfil its purpose. The holistic approach I mentioned when designing the product must also be used when designing a building or a room. The third reason is that people are becoming more aware of what bad acoustic conditions they create for themselves and require buildings and rooms with good acoustic conditions. Restaurants are a good example. Many of us have been to restaurants where the acoustic conditions are terrible, which means that we just want to finish the meal and go home. If we go to one of the most famous restaurant platforms, we will see that one of the main complaints of people is noise and terrible acoustic conditions. People are becoming more and more demanding and are looking for acoustic comfort. 

Does Vicoustic reach many customers who realize the problem with acoustics only when theoretically everything is finished? For example, when they move into a new home and it turns out that it's hard to talk about, let alone listen to music or watch a movie? 
Yes, it happens very often. We must distinguish between two problems that may occur here. The first is bad internal acoustic conditions, such as excessive reverberation, echoes, etc. Usually, even after arranging such a room, a solution to this problem can be found. The second is the lack of effective sound insulation. And in this case finding a good solution after the construction is very difficult and expensive. That is why a good acoustic project is so important and that's why it is worth thinking about it at the beginning. 

Living quarters decorated in the style of the sixties, seventies or eighties seem to be better in terms of their natural acoustics than modern apartments and lofts with their minimalist design, many flat surfaces, large windows, stone stairs, etc. Is it harder or easier to design acoustic systems that could function well in such conditions? In other words, don't current trends and materials make your work easier for you? 
In the rooms decorated in the sixties, seventies and eighties, there are usually many objects that help absorb and distract the sound. On the other hand, as you mentioned, modern apartments have a very minimalist design, thanks to which all hard surfaces are exposed, which improves sound reflection, and therefore in such conditions we usually end up with excessive reverberation. Designing acoustic systems for a minimalist, modern room is very demanding. I think there are two solutions here. One of them is the assumption that the product is part of the design - an integral element of the interior. Another way is to create a product that matches the room decor and becomes almost imperceptible. One of our goals is to solve these problems and that's why we offer both types of such products - panels that are properly structural elements of the room and systems that can be combined with its decor. In the first category, we can list all VMT lines in which we find acoustic panels that looks like stone, concrete, wood, of any uniform color or pattern. Virtual Material Technology (VMT) allows us to create acoustic solutions that can go unnoticed. 

In a variety of acoustic systems, a normal person can quickly get lost. There are structures for walls, for ceilings, but also for desks (for example, those separating office spaces) or standing in free space. There are absorbing, diffusion, mixed systems ... Can you think of it all yourself so that it will be good, or is the help of professionals always indicated? 
The help of a professional is always advisable. As you say, it's easy to get lost in the amount of solutions you have. A specialist can easily understand what you want and lead a solution. This is the reason why Vicoustic has its own design department that helps people use our products and find the best solutions for their rooms. 

If we choose a complete installation, how should it work? What should a professional do, what will he measure, what will he probably propose to us? What could be the end result? 
Generally speaking, a complete room acoustic installation should cover three basic areas - sound insulation, noise control and sound treatment. The idea is not to cause or not be exposed to disturbing noise from neighbouring rooms (sound insulation), to prevent exposure to noise caused by devices such as furnaces or air conditioners (noise control) and to obtain good acoustic conditions that correspond to the purpose premises (acoustic treatment). If we are dealing with a living room, we can measure the sound insulation between this room and adjacent rooms, noise from, for example, radiators or ventilation devices, and the impulse response of the room, where we can take several acoustic parameters, such as reverberation time. Based on the results, we should design appropriate solutions in accordance with the best practice guidelines or regulations that may exist for this particular type of room. If the room does not yet exist, we can, for example, measure the level of ambient noise to design the sound insulation of the building facade. All the rest must be designed in accordance with the acoustic data and models as well as guidelines or regulations in force in the given country. The end result should be a room that fulfils its task in all three of these areas. 

Looking through your panels, you can always find very specific parameters and even graphs showing the effectiveness of sound absorption at different frequencies. Can you theoretically design the installation so that even in the worst room with acoustics you get the perfect listening conditions? 
Yes, it is possible. That is why we have so many products. Some of them are designed to work with low frequencies, others with medium or high frequencies. To solve the problem of room acoustics, a combination of different products is usually used to achieve an even room response to sound. 

Companies that produce amplifiers or loudspeakers usually have their own listening rooms where they test prototypes. How does it look from the perspective of the manufacturer of acoustic panels? Do you have any rooms where the equipment remains the same and the panels change? In other words, are these products tested under normal natural conditions before they finally reach the market? 
We have our own innovative acoustic chamber that allows you to test all products before they reach the market. Our chamber has features that are still unique on a global scale. It is an adaptive volume chamber that allows us to carry out acoustic tests in rooms of various sizes. The 4-ton mechanical wall allows us to adjust the chamber size and thus study the low frequency solutions in depth. We can also relatively quickly transform it into a professional anechoic chamber, enabling measurements of both diffuse and free fields, which gives our engineers the opportunity to test and develop various products. By placing the mechanical wall in different positions, it is possible to test a product sample with precise frequencies. 

The Vicoustic catalog is currently divided into three main tabs: studio / professional panels, panels for homes and flats, and products for public spaces. Are these three completely different worlds? Or is the technique the same, and only the appearance is different? 
These are completely different worlds. The most important thing in recording studios is comfortable listening to the details of the recordings. In homes and apartments, we usually want to create structures for listening and cinema halls or other typically recreational rooms. In public and working space we usually deal with speech, which is why low frequencies are not a problem that high. These are also rooms where the most important is the use of fireproof panels. 

In the tab with products intended for public spaces and offices we will find very interesting things, not only acoustic panels, but also some strange fillings, foams, anti-vibration systems for mounting beams to suspended ceilings, drywall supports ... It's actually a full building mouth. But these are also things that the customer must think about very, very early. Later, it is no longer possible to smash the entire ceiling to mount other brackets. Do you often meet with clients who say "eh, if I knew then that there was such a thing ..."? 
Yes, exactly. You should think about sound insulation at a very early stage. As I mentioned earlier, solving problems related to sound insulation after construction is usually very difficult and expensive. 

Is the office and utility market a very large part of your business today? 
Yes, it becomes a huge part of our business. Not only because of the number of these projects, but also their scale and nature. We usually talk about facilities much larger than recording studios or professional listening rooms. 

In your portfolio you present ready installations, with photos and a list of panels used in a given interior. Do customers like to model them? 
The purpose of showing some projects that use Vicoustic products is not only to help people who would like to do something similar in their rooms, but also to provide customers with our references so that they can be sure that they are doing the right choice of our company's products. 

Take, for example, ViCloud VMT Flat ceiling panels. There are 15 solid colors and 7 pattern collections to choose from, in each collection there are several or several versions to choose from, and there are also 4 shapes - hexagon, circle, square and petal - such a fidget-spinner. This gives you an unbelievable number of combinations. And this is only one panel, and yet there are hundreds of them in the Vicoustic offer, I don't know, right now? Does such a huge variety of products offer logistical problems? Is virtually every panel made to order? Because in this situation it is hard to imagine that all these versions will be collected in some magazine? 
Of course, we have several bestsellers in each category, which are almost always in stock. Any other product is made to order. 

So are there no problems with waiting times? In Portugal, it is probably a little easier, but when it comes to delivery, say to the US or Asia, the case may drag on. And yet we often talk about orders that contractors are threatened with severe fines for exceeding the deadlines. Can all this be reconciled? 
We have made huge investments in our factory and production. We now have two different factories producing exclusively Vicoustic products. In the case of wooden panels we are talking about a 6-week delivery time, while in the case of the VMT line we are already working on a 2-week period. All our customers are informed about these deadlines, and our production, quality control and trade departments manage it all in such a way as to be on time with everything. 

On YouTube you can find many videos where people arrange panels in a given room and everything looks great - there are special tapes, glues and various other gadgets, but in reality it does not always look so pink? Are you trying to design your panels so that even a normal user can mount them yourself, without the help of installers? 
Exactly. All of our panels are easy to install and all have very detailed and easy installation instructions. There is generally no need for professional installers. 

How do your products receive audiophiles? You can see that you really like professionals and sound engineers, you intensely target the market of offices, hotels and other facilities of this type, and you also have many cinema and listening rooms, but I can't help the impression that in the latter case we are talking mainly about ready installations, showrooms, shops, and even listening rooms for manufacturers of hi-fi equipment. The story of someone having an ordinary living room, home, listening room and suddenly changed it with Vicoustic panels is not much. Or maybe I'm wrong? 
It's just an impression. Our products are very well received by audiophiles. For example, three years ago, one of the best-selling Vicoustic diffusers, Multifuser DC2, won the Best Accessory Award in the competition "Hi-Fi +". Many audiophiles reach our design department with a request to help in "treating" their rooms, and the Vicoustic portfolio in this matter is huge. 

How do different acoustic systems sell depending on the country? Can you see any interesting trends here, any countries clearly standing out from the others? 
Basically, we sell acoustic panels around the world. There may be some design trends that vary slightly from area to area, but we don't really feel that much. Bestsellers are bestsellers around the world. 

The subject of acoustics has become so fashionable lately that many, many companies producing acoustic panels are created. Many of them are also experimenting strongly with materials and patterns - various artificial mosses, sponges, foams appear, not to mention that it is easier for companies operating on the local market to meet the needs of customers on the spot. Often you can get the impression that "this is something anyone can do" - a little sponge, felt, cork, plywood and it's ready. It may sound brutal, but what makes you stand out from the competition? 
I would say that there are many things that make us stand out from the competition. If you analyze the history of Vicoustic, you will see that we always push the issue of acoustics forward and lead in this race by several lengths. We first came out with the Visual Acoustics concept, integrating design and acoustics in the product. For several years, our goal has been to develop sustainable products. We have now become one of the main players developing sustainable acoustic solutions. Last year, we helped pull 250 tons of plastic waste from the oceans that we used in our new line of acoustic panels. Our employees are another distinguishing feature of Vicoustic. We have highly specialized employees in all company departments. Starting from the heart of our company, a factory located in the largest production cluster in Portugal, which guarantees highly specialized and motivated employees. All other departments in the company are very well connected, and values ​​such as honesty to our clients, quality, rigor and organization are something that we value very much. In addition, we have our own quality control department, which by the way provides excellent support to our clients. Another important factor is having your own laboratory facilities. This allows Vicoustic to fine-tune the final solutions as well as test various product configurations. which, by the way, provides excellent support to our clients. 

When we want to buy loudspeakers, a turntable or a power cable, we can usually test it, arrange a listening session or rent it. Of course, some tests can be carried out with acoustic panels, but most often you have to decide on something and keep your fingers crossed that the effect will be what we expected. Or maybe there are some methods to model it, some simulators, where the customer could say put on headphones, download the application, take pictures of your room, and then virtually insert such and such panels into it and turn them on / off to assess their impact on the sound? 
There are things that can be mastered and guaranteed without much trouble. If the room has excessive reverberation, it is easy to identify solutions that will solve them with very high certainty. In terms of acoustic processing, the biggest problem occurs when controlling low frequencies. This is more difficult to provide, usually because people do not always have enough space to properly "treat" the problem. However, if there is space, there are techniques and solutions that can provide tangible improvements even in such a difficult area. 

I would like to return to the topic of ecology for a moment. Many of your products are made of properly processed plastic and it is not enough that you clean the environment in this way, but such panels will also be recyclable. Is it true? 
Yes. And this is something we are really proud of. All Vicoustic employees are very committed to this mission. Once again, we feel that we are changing this market. 

Plans for the near future? 
In Portugal, we say that "secret is the soul of business". Basically, our plan is to remain loyal to our clients and to ourselves. We believe that Vicoustic should constantly pave the way, introduce acoustic innovations and technologies so that we can remain a leader in the industry, as well as provide the best acoustics in every space. We will definitely continue to search for and develop sustainable acoustic solutions and improve the design and performance of our panels. And what exactly the future holds - we'll see. 

This interview was conducted by Tomasz Karasiński and published by StereoLife Magazine in May 2020. You can see the original interview, in Polish, at StereoLife - Gustavo Pires Interview. All questions and comments from the interviewer are the responsibility of the authors.

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