Bang & Olufsen Beogram 8800
Disclaimer: Student concept, not real
Throughout the course of Bang & Olufsen’s 92 year existence, they have produced a number of the world’s most beautiful and highly regarded designs in the audio and television industry.
In 1965, Bang & Olufsen produced its first record deck, the Beogram 1000.

B&O continued to produce stunning turntables during the peak of the vinyl LP throughout the 70’s and 80’s. Complex engineering hidden behind a cloak of exquisite taste and design was B&O’s approach to all of their vinyl record players. They didn’t just settle for a beautiful object, they also wanted to push the boundaries of turntable technology. The obsolescence of vinyl and the introduction of CD saw the decline in B&O turntables with the last player ceasing production in 1996.

Today, Bang & Olufsen’s portfolio primarily consists of stand-alone speakers, headphones, TVs, and sound systems (receivers and linkable speakers). Their speakers blur the line between art and design, acting as stand-alone pieces that have just as much visual appeal as performance.



So what if Bang & Olufsen brought back their Beogram line to capitalize on the resurgence of vinyl records? What if Bang & Olufsen combined their audacious and uncompromising design philosophy and audio performance with the classic and nostalgic turntable deck?
This seems like an appropriate next step for B&O. They could make a turntable more like a beautiful piece of furniture in a home. It could even have built in speakers, not like a bulky media console, but rather a refined, sculptural piece.
Thus the Beogram 8800.




This Beogram system, utilizing the 8000 series designation for its use of a linear tracking tonearm, is a bold testament to B&O’s strive for elegance and function.
The Beogram 8800 features metal capacitive touch points for volume and turntable controls, a sliding glass cover, and a full range speaker tower as the support.
The general idea came from wanting the turntable to actually look like an accent table up against a wall. From there, I drew inspiration from past B&O products. For example, the abstracted pentagonal turntable body was taken from the Beolab 19 (pictured earlier) as a nod to designer Jakob Wagner who drew his inspiration from the dodecahedron. The stainless steel details were inspired by early B&O turntables from the 70’s and 80’s. The chrome feature of the speaker tower was inspired by the Beolab 8000 as a nod to designer David Lewis who drew his inspiration from an organ pipe. Other features such as the cantilever design, elegant taper of the bottom of the turntable deck, and form mimicking of the tonearm and base were my stylistic decisions.

Disclaimer: Student concept, not real