The Ned NoMad Hotel in New York City, part of the Soho House Group, recently opened in collaboration with famed club entrepreneur and nightlife savant, Richie Akiva, who created 1 OAK, as The Ned’s Creative Director. This is The Ned Hotel’s first American outpost, and to ensure a high-quality, versatile audio experience for its guests, the hotel turned to 1 SOUND solutions.
Unlike a typical hotel, even most luxury hotels, The Ned NoMad was renovated to honor the original details and charm of the building. It almost feels like stepping back in time, while going beyond the standards of the modern hospitality industry. Design is truly paramount to the experience.
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“The littlest details are the most important things. While not everyone notices them, the people who do notice them, that small percentage of people are the people you want to impress. That’s who we do it for,” explained Akiva. Needless to say for Akiva, every detail in the hotel’s club spaces were thoughtfully designed to provide the exclusive Soho House experience where every factor is of the highest quality including the audio.
With the help of Akiva, The Ned NoMad has stepped into this dark, dramatic, and already rather clubby space and taken it to another level. Located at the heart of Ned’s Club Downstairs is a versatile performance space with an installed 1 SOUND sound system, called The Atrium. The atrium has a glass roof for an open feeling and marble flooring. At night, the space transforms into a lounge with nightly live performances on stage. Spectra Audio Design Group who has worked with the Soho House Group before, approached the audio design of this new club, with an aligned vision of a premium experience for members and decided to go with 1 SOUND loudspeakers.
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Spectra deployed two Tower LCC84’s and mounted them using their respective Wall Brackets for the main PA. The controlled cardioid behavior of the Towers is ideal for the space to help reduce reflections in the room. The Towers have a narrow dispersion pattern at 120-degrees wide and five degrees off the top and bottom of the column with rear-cancellation of about 20 dB. These qualities combined helped to create more control over where the sound is placed in the room and avoiding sound going into the glass roof or reflecting off the wall where the speaker is mounted. For distributed bass six reflex design SUB12’s were used and hidden throughout the venue.
“We have had weekly programming from live jazz bands to top New York DJs as well as pop-ups by Miguel, Badius, and Robin Thicke. There are major acts in the works for future performances and we will continue to surprise guests with exciting musical programming,” said Akiva.
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For the stage of the venue there are six Cannon C6’s with for aiming as the performer's monitors. The Cannons are small on stage but provide the SPL needed when there is a full band or a nightclub act performing. The Cannon C6’s are high-fidelity durable loudspeakers that have an extended bandwidth down to 60 hz so singers or upright bass players are able to hear themselves in a clear and accurate reproduction. They are situated on stage so they can be versatile for performers who come in and out daily.
By any metric, the opening of The Ned was a glamorous affair. The crowd, ambiance and stellar entertainment proves that Richie Akiva is most certainly the top name at the helm of global hospitality and the perfect name to lead and curate the New York outpost of The Ned brand.
