*** UPDATE: This is a revised version of an older post with new information.
"Hi-Fi" and "Outdoor", that sounds like a contradiction. But with the right technology it is, in fact, not only possible to have music play in your outdoor areas but to actually enjoy it in very good quality. Of course you need a number of loudspeakers for that. But there are ways to place these in a way that they won't ruin the look of your garden. Numerous manufacturers have specialized in exactly this and have various solutions for the problem in their range. Below, we'll show selection of products with which kicking back some music becomes an outdoor activity.
The loudspeakers of the Ci series from Cornered Audio are particularly suitable on balconies or the terrace, but also work in the garden shed. They are intended for installation in corners, which not only serves as a way to inconspicuously place the speakers, but is also conducive to propagation of sound waves.
The Ci speakers are available in different sizes, and thanks to their IP65 certification, they are all suitable for outdoor use. Special versions with 100V technology can also be used in places in the garden where conventional passive loudspeakers would not be an option due to long cable runs.
If you want to hide loudspeakers out of sight, it of course helps if the chosen transducers do not even look like loudspeakers. This is what the American specialty supplier Sonance thought and that's why its ROCK series has been in its range for years.
These loudspeakers, available in three sizes including a subwoofer, look convincingly like real stones and can therefore be placed inconspicuously practically anywhere. The Sonance ROCK withstand all kinds of weather so they can easily be left outside all year round. With a few of them distributed in different flowerbeds, a very even music reproduction throughout the garden can be achieved.
For loudspeakers in the outdoor area, the same physical laws apply to all sound transducers. Among other things, that means that a small speaker cannot offer unlimited amounts of bass. For the reproduction of low frequencies you need volume, there is no getting around it. However, at low frequencies it is much more difficult for the human ear to recognize the direction from which the sound is coming. This has long been used in compact hi-fi and home theater systems for home use: One simply separates the low frequency range from the rest, so that one end up with a system of satellite speakers and a subwoofer. The latter is then hidden in a corner somewhere, while the compact satellites remain at their normal location.
In the garden there are even better ways to hide the subwoofer - you can just bury it. The custom installation specialist Sonance, for example, offers several powerful outdoor subwoofers that almost completely disappear underground. Only a weather-protected sound outlet then protrudes from the earth that can easily be concealed under a bush or behind a flower pot.
Then all you have to do is to literally let gras grow over the matter (or flowers, of course) and your subwoofer is practically invisible.
The satellite speakers of the SONARRAY SR1 system are small enough to be hidden between all kinds of vegetation, even in tall grass. But Don't be fooled by their small size! The SONARRAY SR1 can be used for very serious outdoor cinema applications as well as music systems that can handle everything from chilled-out background music to high party volumes. In addition, the SONARRAY SR1 is designed in such a way that the eight satellites and the subwoofer together represent a load of around 8 ohms. This means they don't need special amplification but can be driven by any modern amplifier. This makes it even easier to integrate the system into a multi-room system in the house.
You can of course also go a completely different way with the musical arrangement of the garden or the terrace: Instead of hiding the speakers somewhere, simply integrate them cleverly into the bigger picture. This is possible, for example, with the luxurious sound sculptures made by Architettura Sonora. The speakers of Italian manufacturer come in a variety of shapes: as organically curved art objects, or as geometric forms carved from of stone, steel or wood. At first glance, and usually also at second and third glance, they will be taken for many things, ranging from simple decoration to places to sit. Only few people will recognize them as loudspeakers at all.
The AS loudspeakers are available in a variety of weatherproof material combinations and are extremely robust. Thanks to numerous material combinations, the right loudspeaker can be found for every environment. They can also be left outside all year round, and will over time get a natural patina so that they will become part of the landscape even more convincingly.
The loudspeakers from Architettura Sonora can also be connected to amplifiers and multiroom systems like normal loudspeakers. So there is no need for additional effort which makes them suitable for a wide variety of applications. The sound sculptures by Architettura Sonora and the almost invisible sub / satellite systems by Sonance are just two examples of how one can elegantly and unobtrusively provide amazingly good sound outdoors today.
Further reading: Outdoor Speakers
