Luxury audio brand Bang & Olufsen (铂傲) is celebrating its grand centenary by turning Shanghai into the first stop of a global exhibition. Titled A Century of Sound (百年拂声), the show will run from March 14 to 22 on Hengshan Road – a flash stretch of city – to mark 100 years of audio greatness by the Danish company.
The exhibition brings B&O’s century-long design story to what’s arguably China’s most design-conscious city. If you’re in town and hit the event, expect a mix of heritage pieces, contemporary collaborations and the kind of sculptural speakers that have made the brand a staple of high-end interiors.
At the centre of the Bang & Olufsen Shanghai Exhibition is something called Art of the A9, a creative project built around the brand’s Beosound A9 speaker – something of an icon in the brand’s portfolio. For this, B&O invited three creators from different disciplines to reinterpret the product as an artwork.
Architect Zhang Yonghe (张永和) leans into minimalism. His version strips away excess design and channels a visual memory of the oversized speakers common in the 1970s and 80s. Designer Li Ximi (李希米) plays with perception. Her design uses textiles to mimic aluminium, creating subtle shifts between light and mid-grey tones that shimmer like metal under changing light.
Meanwhile tech creator He Tongxue (何同学) takes a more playful route. His piece combines mechanical engineering with traditional Hangzhou embroidery, turning the A9’s circular surface into a kind of kinetic artwork with moving petals a la the classical Chinese garden’s moon gates.
The exhibition also digs into B&O’s archives, displaying antique radios dating back nearly a century, alongside design classics, some of which are now part of the New York MoMA permanent collection. It’s a neat way to celebrate a centenary: the exhibition leans into the design prowess that B&O have built their brand around. For a brand that has spent a century turning speakers into design icons, celebrating the milestone with an art exhibition feels like a natural encore.
