Hi All,

Both Wendy and myself just wanted to send everyone a a huge thanks for your support over the last 12 months which really did help make 2017 another awesome year for both HiFi Lounge and Highend Headphones, for me I still find it amazing that there really are this many people that love their music and HiFi, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it so thanks again all and I know I have said this before but I really do believe that we have the best customers :-)

Expansion Into New Showrooms

I guess it is only natural to look back over the last 12 months at this time of year and for us I guess one of the major highlights has to be the start of the work for our new showrooms and then seeing them finished, inevitably they took a lot longer than originally planned but we couldn’t be happier with the end results.

Basically the Naim Lounge went from this -



To This -



And the Highend Room From this -



To This -



Another Year of Great Open Days

Again we had some great open days with brilliant turn outs as ever so thanks to everyone who came along, we started with the launch of our Naim Lounge with the Naim Statement and PMC BB5 SE’s really testing out the acoustics of the new room, another highlight was the Devialet Lost Recording evening where we played a Sarah Vaughan Lacquer costing around £7000 that could only be played once and it really did sound amazing.



Then we had our Boys Toys Day II, although the weather was a little hit and miss it was still a brilliant day where we met at HFL for breakfast then went onto dCS to hear some really incredible HiFi, hopefully do another one in 2018, got an interesting idea if we can pull it off so watch this space.



Finally we celebrated our 5th Anniversary in October with a brilliant day where it really was great to see so many familiar faces but the star of the day had to be Peter Thomas, the founder of PMC Speakers, who run our Highend Room all day with an amazing selection of his rare recordings, we really couldn’t fit everyone in the room.



HiFi Road Trips - It’s a Tough Life!

So both Wendy and myself had 2 brilliant trips this year, I was taken to Utah for a Wilson Audio trip I will never forget, the real highlight was a visit to Dave Wilson’s home where I got to hear the incredible WAMM Speakers, without a doubt the most incredible HiFi I have ever heard, if I had a spare 1 million Pounds then I know where it would be going.



Wendy also went galavanting abroad with a trip to the Sennheiser factory in Germany, not sure that was such a good idea though as she ordered a £54,000 HE-1 Orpheus headphone system for the Highend Headphones showroom which should be here early next year all being well, that’s the last time I let her out on her own :-)



Album of the Year 2017

Again it has been a pretty good year for music, thank god it hasn’t seen so many artists pass away like 2016, my favourite albums came down to a choice of 4 really, I’m sure the first one will make people groan a little but for me my most played albums have been James Blunt ‘The Afterlove’, Lorde with ‘Melodrama’, London Grammar’s*‘Truth Is A Beautiful Thing’* and Liam Gallagher’s ‘As You Were’ but the clear winner is easily Lorde for me, such a brilliant album with every song being superb but for me the standout track has got to be ‘Lady Writer’ which really does still give me goosebumps so I highly recommend this if you haven’t tried it, I still can’t believe she is only 21, amazing talent. I also want to give a shout out to ‘Baby Driver’, most definitely my favourite film of the year, the 1st 10 Minutes must be one of the best opening scenes ever plus it has an amazing soundtrack a very cool film.



2017 HiFi Highlights.



Another year with some truly great new products like Chord’s amazing Hugo 2 and quite incredible Blu II, this has really made CD playback relevant for me again, the stunning dCS Network bridge, the beautiful new Sonus Faber Homage range of speakers, another great turntable from Rega with the Planar 6, the brilliant PMC COR amplifier and at long last Naim finally got the new Uniti Range to market and I think it is fair to say it was definitely worth the wait, so all in all not too bad a year really, I am sure next year we will see some more great new products, saying that I have just ordered some new products that I have been promising myself since launching HFL, more news in January :-)



Breaking News

In a nice way to end the year we have just found out that we have been awarded ‘Best Retail Experience 2017’ by PMC Speakers for the 4th year running which is fantastic news, thanks PMC, we love you too :-) press release below.

Best retail experience 2017 – HiFi Lounge

Another multiple winner, HiFi Lounge has now achieved the “Best Retail Experience’ award for four years running, and once again was awarded purely on the basis of customer feedback. the Dunton, Bedfordshire, business has been widely commended for its very warm welcome, stunning surroundings and contagious enthusiasm for PMC loudspeakers.


So there we go, as we say goodbye to 2017 both Wendy and myself would just like to wish everyone a Brilliant Christmas and a Prosperous and Healthy 2018.

Looking forward to seeing what 2018 has to throw at us :-)

Many thanks and all the best,

Regards.

Paul & Wendy.

Christmas Opening Times -

  • Friday 22nd - PM Only
  • Saturday 23rd - AM Only
  • Sunday 24th - Closed
  • Monday 25th - Closed
  • Tuesday 26th - Closed
  • Wednesday 27th - Closed
  • Thursday 28th - AM Only
  • Friday 29th - AM Only
  • Saturday 30th - AM Only
  • Sunday 31st - Closed*
  • Monday 1st - Closed
  • Tuesday 2nd - Back Open As Normal