At Cinema Buro there isn't one principal running the company. There are four of us, and every project gets all four. In this short video, just over three minutes, I walk through the process every one of our rooms goes through, and explain why every decision we take along the way has to be defensible.
Four principals in one room
Between the four of us we have more than 125 years of experience building rooms. The real value of that isn't the number. It's that we argue. When a project comes in, all four of us look at it. We get into a room, study the plans and work out what we're going to do with it.
That conversation follows a process. Each stage builds on the one before it, and the products come last.
Discovery: asking really good questions
Everything starts with what we call discovery, the Listen stage on our process map. Discovery is about asking really good questions. Some of those are for the client. Just as many are about the project itself: what the constraints are, and everything else we have to take into account.
Every room has to compromise somewhere. Discovery is how we find the right balance of compromises, and getting that balance right is what lets us deliver a really exceptional room.
Design: defining the experience in numbers
After discovery comes design, the Plan stage. Design is about defining the experience in numbers. They aren't arbitrary numbers. Each one relates to something people actually experience, and together they describe how good the room is going to be for the people who sit in it and watch the most incredible movies.
Engineering: what the room will actually do
Next is engineering, the Prove stage. Engineering converts that definition of the experience into the raw set of numbers that shows, on paper, exactly what the room is going to do.
Specification comes last
Only then do we reach specification, the Select stage, and ask which products we're going to use.
We don't start with products. Products are the things we use to deliver the engineering needs. Those needs are defined during design, and the design is informed by discovery. A product specification is the outcome of that process, not the starting point.
What does defensible mean in cinema design?
At every stage, every single decision we take is defensible. What I mean by that is simple.
We're not choosing a speaker because some random person on a YouTube video said it was good. We're not choosing an acoustically transparent fabric because the manufacturer told us it was acoustically transparent. We test those things. And we're not positioning speakers because a mate said he tried something once and it was better.
Every decision we make can be defended in one of three ways:
- in engineering terms
- by relating it to a standard or a recommended practice
- by showing the maths
Is a bill of materials defensible?
If all you're being given is a bill of materials, a long list of equipment that doesn't tell you what the system is actually going to do, have a think. Is that defensible?
What we do at Cinema Buro means that absolutely every part of the project, from design, engineering and specification through to build, calibration and delivery, is something we can defend in front of anybody in the world.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Every Decision Defensible video about?
It's a short video in which Peter Aylett, Client Director of Cinema Buro, explains how the practice designs a private cinema. He walks through discovery, design, engineering and specification, and explains why every decision Cinema Buro makes has to be defensible through engineering, standards and recommended practices, or the maths.
How does Cinema Buro design a private cinema?
Every project is reviewed by all four principals and moves through discovery, design, engineering and specification in that order. Discovery establishes the questions, constraints and compromises. Design defines the experience in numbers. Engineering shows on paper exactly what the room will do. Specification then selects the products that deliver it. Build, calibration and delivery follow.
What makes a cinema design decision defensible?
A defensible decision can be justified in engineering terms, by reference to a standard or recommended practice, or by showing the maths. It isn't based on an online opinion, a manufacturer's claim that hasn't been tested, or what a friend once tried.
Why shouldn't a cinema design start with products?
Products are the means of delivering the engineering needs, and those needs come from the design and discovery stages. Starting with products means choosing equipment before anyone has defined what the room needs to do. A bill of materials on its own doesn't tell you what the system will actually achieve.
Who is Peter Aylett?
Peter Aylett is Client Director of Cinema Buro, a private cinema design practice. He is one of the authors of the international standards the private cinema industry is now measured against, and has designed and calibrated reference-grade rooms for some of the most demanding clients in the world.
Read the full video transcript
[00:00] At Cinema Buro, we do things a bit differently. One of the different things about the way we work is, rather than just having one principal of the company, there's four of us, and between us we have over 125 years of experience building rooms. And the superpower that gives us is we argue, we debate when we have a project come along.
[00:23] All four of us look at it. We get into a room. We study the plans. We figure out, right, what are we going to do with this? But that starts with a process that we call discovery. And discovery is about asking really great questions, not just questions to the customer, but also figuring out what are the project constraints, what are all of the things that we have to consider, to then come up with the balance of compromises. And every room has to have compromise somewhere.
[00:51] Those balanced compromises deliver a really, really exceptional room. After discovery, there's design, and design is about defining the user experience in numbers, but in numbers that relate experientially to the things that define how good that place is going to be for actual people to sit and watch the most incredible movies. After that, we go on to engineering. Engineering is converting that definition of the experience into the raw set of numbers on a piece of paper that shows exactly what that room is going to do.
[01:27] And finally, we have specification. What products do we use? And the other really interesting thing about the way we work is that every single stage, every single decision we take, is defensible. And what I mean by that is we're not choosing a speaker just because some random person on a YouTube video said it was good. We're not choosing an acoustically transparent fabric because the manufacturer told us it was acoustically transparent.
[01:54] We test those things. We're not positioning speakers because some mate said, oh, I did this and this was better. Every single decision we make, every single one, is defensible in engineering terms, is defensible by relating it to a standard or a recommended practice, is defensible by actually showing the maths. A product specification is the outcome of that process.
[02:21] We don't start with products. Products are the things that we use to deliver the engineering needs, which are defined during the design, and that design is then informed by discovery. So if all you're getting is just a bill of materials, lots of equipment that doesn't tell you what that system's actually going to do, just have a think. Is that defensible?
[02:46] What we do at Cinema Buro means that absolutely every single part of that design, engineering, specification, build, calibration and delivery, we can defend what we're doing in front of anybody in the world.