Design Milk speaks with Aki Laine, Sonos Director of Industrial Design, about the brand's first ever headphones, the Sonos Ace, a wearable inspired by Marcel Breuer?s Wassily Chair.

The Sonos Ace design story begins with Marcel Breuer?s Wassily Chair. Representing an idealized balance between contrasts ? soft with hard, simple and complex, machined versus the human body ? the iconic Bauhaus modernist design offered the Sonos design team a perfect aesthetic and functional template for designing what would become the brand’s first headphones. Across the Wassily Chair, hard, shiny metal is tasked for structural support while soft and supple leather is assigned to offering a comfortable touch point (vegan leather, in the case of the Ace). While no one sets out to wear a chair on their head, the parallels between the Sonos Ace’s clean lines and subtle angled profile are evident across its combination of contrasting materials. We spoke with Aki Laine, Sonos’ Director of Industrial Design about some of the individual details that together results in what he believes makes the Sonos Ace headphones a unique entry in the competitive field of ANC headphones.
Inclusive Comfort at its Core
From the outset, the Sonos design team identified a comfortable fit as essential. According to Laine the shape of the Ace ear cups are the result of extensive ergonomic research. “We did research comfort testing with nearly 600 participants, representing a range in ag...