Castle (company)
Encyclopedia
Castle is a British
manufacturer of hi-fi loudspeaker
s.
Castle Acoustics was founded in 1973 and takes its name and its logo from the 11thC historic Skipton Castle, the North Yorkshire market town of Skipton having been Castle's home since its foundation. Tradition dies hard in the high Pennine hills where Skipton is located and it is this tradition of the craftsman that remains the cornerstone of Castle's philosophy to this day, albeit allied to the latest advances in drive unit technology and cabinet design.
Castle is the only British loudspeaker manufacturer to build its own cabinets; buy and lay veneers for those cabinets; and develop and build its own drive units; all under one roof. Castle offer hand-finished cabinets in no less than nine real wood veneers as standard and can match to special order. It is no coincidence that several of England's most prestigious speaker manufacturers seek out Castle for cabinetry to match the quality and cost of their products.
History
Little has changed in the design and manufacture of loudspeakers in the nearly 70 years since Rice and Kellog first published their paper ' Notes on the design of a new type of hornless loudspeaker' in 1925, proposing the notion of a moving coil loudspeaker. One Oliver Lodge first filed a design for a moving diaphragm radiator as long ago as 1890 but this was primarily for telephone use. It was, at the time described as a 'Bellowing Telephone'. However the rise of radio broadcasting during the 1920s prompted the demand for something different that was capable of producing better sound quality. Since that time materials and techniques may have changed, but little else.
In 1932 a former wool merchant from Bradford first formed The Wharfedale Wireless Company primarily to further the design and manufacture of loudspeakers to reproduce as accurately as possible, the music in which he was keenly interested. That man was Gilbert Briggs and it his legacy that has, over two generations, passed to the Castle Acoustics of today, still located in Wharfedale in North Yorkshire.
Until the arrival of stereo in the late 1950s' loudspeakers only needed to be used one at a time and all speakers were then made in much the same way that Castle's are today - carefully and by hand. The arrival of stereo in 1958 and with it the need for two speakers, allied to the rapid growth of home hi-fi during the late 1960s and early 70s gave birth to the mass produced cabinets we see all around us today. These cabinets are produced by mechanised processes and covered in, in the main, in a poor vinyl imitation of wood. During those boom years Gilbert Briggs' Wharfedale brand became Britain's biggest, and most widely distributed loudspeaker brand. It is still today the most widely recognised brand name for loudspeakers. By virtue of size and the need to position them amongst the furniture in the home the new mass-produced cabinets left a gap in the market for those requiring speakers that could match up to the quality and appearance of their home furnishings.
It was with this in mind that, in 1973 a group of Wharfedale senior managers took the radical step of detaching themselves from this rapid expansion, preferring to go back to the concept of the old-style craftsmen but working with modern acoustic technologies. Moving further up Wharfedale to Skipton, located in an old woollen mill, Castle Acoustics was born on 3 September 1973.
The growth and success of the Company during the following years bear witness to rightness of that decision. A succession of speaker models was produced, impeccably finished, winning critical acclaim world-wide, all named after British castles and rivers - Conway, Trent, Stirling, Clyde etc. All were designed, built, and assembled in cabinets made in the same location, Park Mill, a solid Yorkshire stone building.
Almost twenty years later, with the original founders fast approaching retiring age, a second group of senior executives from Wharfedale, with similar feelings about the craftsman-led approach, made a proposal to buy out the original management team. The objective was to build on that twenty years' success and take Castle into the twenty-first century, remaining committed to the craftsman approach, whilst retaining as much of the original founders' acquired wisdom and experience as required, or as they were prepared to contribute. Indeed the son of one of the original founders is today in charge of Production Engineering - a second generation already in place.
The new management team, strengthened by investment from the Lancashire Enterprise Agency, will allow Castle to grow, to generate new export business, the lifeblood of any island-based small manufacturing company, to invest in new plant and machinery, providing employment in an area where unemployment runs high, and to develop Castle products appropriate to today's more discerning markets.
Castle today
Castle is now part of the International Audio Group, and under the watchful eyes of Director for Acoustic Design, Peter Comeau, Castle has begun to re-establish itself in the hi fi community.
Products
Some review quotes
"High frequencies are rapid and detailed, and the midrange is equally impressive."
"A worthy award-winner"
"A true resurgence for the Castle brand. The Knight 2 has a beguiling sound quality and enviable finish"
"Finely finished, tastefully styled floorstander with a crisp, concise and open sound"
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
manufacturer of hi-fi loudspeaker
Loudspeaker
A loudspeaker is an electroacoustic transducer that produces sound in response to an electrical audio signal input. Non-electrical loudspeakers were developed as accessories to telephone systems, but electronic amplification by vacuum tube made loudspeakers more generally useful...
s.
Castle Acoustics was founded in 1973 and takes its name and its logo from the 11thC historic Skipton Castle, the North Yorkshire market town of Skipton having been Castle's home since its foundation. Tradition dies hard in the high Pennine hills where Skipton is located and it is this tradition of the craftsman that remains the cornerstone of Castle's philosophy to this day, albeit allied to the latest advances in drive unit technology and cabinet design.
Castle is the only British loudspeaker manufacturer to build its own cabinets; buy and lay veneers for those cabinets; and develop and build its own drive units; all under one roof. Castle offer hand-finished cabinets in no less than nine real wood veneers as standard and can match to special order. It is no coincidence that several of England's most prestigious speaker manufacturers seek out Castle for cabinetry to match the quality and cost of their products.
History
Little has changed in the design and manufacture of loudspeakers in the nearly 70 years since Rice and Kellog first published their paper ' Notes on the design of a new type of hornless loudspeaker' in 1925, proposing the notion of a moving coil loudspeaker. One Oliver Lodge first filed a design for a moving diaphragm radiator as long ago as 1890 but this was primarily for telephone use. It was, at the time described as a 'Bellowing Telephone'. However the rise of radio broadcasting during the 1920s prompted the demand for something different that was capable of producing better sound quality. Since that time materials and techniques may have changed, but little else.
In 1932 a former wool merchant from Bradford first formed The Wharfedale Wireless Company primarily to further the design and manufacture of loudspeakers to reproduce as accurately as possible, the music in which he was keenly interested. That man was Gilbert Briggs and it his legacy that has, over two generations, passed to the Castle Acoustics of today, still located in Wharfedale in North Yorkshire.
Until the arrival of stereo in the late 1950s' loudspeakers only needed to be used one at a time and all speakers were then made in much the same way that Castle's are today - carefully and by hand. The arrival of stereo in 1958 and with it the need for two speakers, allied to the rapid growth of home hi-fi during the late 1960s and early 70s gave birth to the mass produced cabinets we see all around us today. These cabinets are produced by mechanised processes and covered in, in the main, in a poor vinyl imitation of wood. During those boom years Gilbert Briggs' Wharfedale brand became Britain's biggest, and most widely distributed loudspeaker brand. It is still today the most widely recognised brand name for loudspeakers. By virtue of size and the need to position them amongst the furniture in the home the new mass-produced cabinets left a gap in the market for those requiring speakers that could match up to the quality and appearance of their home furnishings.
It was with this in mind that, in 1973 a group of Wharfedale senior managers took the radical step of detaching themselves from this rapid expansion, preferring to go back to the concept of the old-style craftsmen but working with modern acoustic technologies. Moving further up Wharfedale to Skipton, located in an old woollen mill, Castle Acoustics was born on 3 September 1973.
The growth and success of the Company during the following years bear witness to rightness of that decision. A succession of speaker models was produced, impeccably finished, winning critical acclaim world-wide, all named after British castles and rivers - Conway, Trent, Stirling, Clyde etc. All were designed, built, and assembled in cabinets made in the same location, Park Mill, a solid Yorkshire stone building.
Almost twenty years later, with the original founders fast approaching retiring age, a second group of senior executives from Wharfedale, with similar feelings about the craftsman-led approach, made a proposal to buy out the original management team. The objective was to build on that twenty years' success and take Castle into the twenty-first century, remaining committed to the craftsman approach, whilst retaining as much of the original founders' acquired wisdom and experience as required, or as they were prepared to contribute. Indeed the son of one of the original founders is today in charge of Production Engineering - a second generation already in place.
The new management team, strengthened by investment from the Lancashire Enterprise Agency, will allow Castle to grow, to generate new export business, the lifeblood of any island-based small manufacturing company, to invest in new plant and machinery, providing employment in an area where unemployment runs high, and to develop Castle products appropriate to today's more discerning markets.
Castle today
Castle is now part of the International Audio Group, and under the watchful eyes of Director for Acoustic Design, Peter Comeau, Castle has begun to re-establish itself in the hi fi community.
Products
- Inversion Range
- Classic Series
- Richmond Classic Series
- Compact Series
- Knight Series
- Richmond Anniversary
Some review quotes
"High frequencies are rapid and detailed, and the midrange is equally impressive."
- Knight 2 - What Hi-Fi? Sound and Vision (February 2011)
"A worthy award-winner"
- Knight 2 - Winner, Best Loudspeaker up to £2,000, Hi-Fi Choice Awards 2010
"A true resurgence for the Castle brand. The Knight 2 has a beguiling sound quality and enviable finish"
- Knight 2 review - Dominic Todd, Hi-Fi Choice (November 2010)
"Finely finished, tastefully styled floorstander with a crisp, concise and open sound"
- Knight 5 review – Noel Keywood, Hi-Fi World (October 2010)
External links
- Castle site
- International Audio Group site
- Peter Comeau, Director for Acoustic Design - International Audio Group Ltd.
- What Hi Fi? Sound and Vision interview with Peter Comeau on Wharfedale Diamond 10.1
- Audio Emotion interview with Peter Comeau on Quad