Project Overview: Museum Acoustics Solutions This project was completed at the Morean Art Museum during a planned bamboo-to-concrete flooring renovation across three main gallery rooms. Six 4×4 acoustic ceiling clouds at NRC 1.05 held the reverberation target before the harder floor surface ever went down, sidestepping the post-renovation noise complaints the manager would otherwise have […]
11
Oct
Oct
Project Overview: Media Room Drywall Soundproofing This project ran during the framing-to-drywall stage of a Westshore custom home build, which is the right moment to add a soundproofing membrane to a media room wall. Retrofitting acoustic membrane after the finish drywall is already up costs roughly four times as much for the same STC lift. […]
13
Sep
Sep
The Real Problem With Office Background Noise Office background noise is one of the biggest disruptors in open offices, coworking spaces, and hybrid workplaces, which is why open plan office acoustics has to balance privacy, focus, and comfort. Search data shows people specifically look for answers about office background noise and white noise side effects, […]
15
Aug
Aug
Project Overview: Commercial Partition Soundproofing This was a low-disruption commercial partition retrofit, not a demolition job. The membrane went on top of the existing drywall on the parts-distributor side, lifted STC from 34 to 40, and let the tenant stay open for business through the entire install. Total acoustic work ran a single weekend. The […]
15
Aug
Aug
Understanding Noise Reduction Inside a Room There’s more confusion in acoustics around noise reduction and absorption than almost any other topic, especially because how sound behaves in a room changes with frequency, surface type, and distance. Even seasoned architects mix up these terms, which leads to poor specs and costly corrections. Noise reduction (NR) refers […]
07
Aug
Aug
Quick Overview The Sabine Formula at a Glance The Sabine formula is the workhorse equation for room acoustics. It predicts how long sound takes to decay 60 dB after the source stops, which is what occupants feel as the “echoiness” of a room. The formula is a simplification, but it is accurate enough for sizing […]
02
Jun
Jun
Understanding How to Soundproof a Floor If you’ve ever lived below a clumsy upstairs neighbor, you already know why soundproofing a floor matters. Whether it’s footsteps, rolling chairs, or the occasional dropped dumbbell, second floor soundproofing matters because impact noise moves fast and loud. For architects, contractors, and developers, ignoring floor acoustics is an open […]
19
May
May
Quick Overview What Acoustic Absorption Actually Is Acoustic absorption is the conversion of sound energy into low-grade heat. A sound wave is air moving back and forth. When that air pushes through fibers, foam cells, or thin pockets, it loses kinetic energy to friction. The lost energy becomes heat, the wave that bounces back is […]
19
May
May
Understanding the Basics of Wall Soundproofing Walls set the tone for how a space feels — private, calm, or painfully loud. Whether it’s traffic noise outside or your neighbor’s late-night TV habitFs, unwanted sound usually finds its way through interior partitions that weren’t built for silence. While no wall is ever perfectly “soundproof,” you can […]
06
May
May
Project Overview: Warehouse Soundproofing This was a full-stack warehouse soundproofing job across three different noise paths. Floor work for footfall transmission from the mezzanine, demising wall work for tenant-to-tenant speech privacy, and 1,100 Sabins of acoustic absorption to tame the open-volume echo. The same warehouse and factory noise control playbook applies whether the warehouse end […]