Ikea and Sonos turn wall art into a Symfonisk Wi-Fi speaker

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Ikea and Sonos cleverly disguised a Wi-Fi speaker in bland wall art.
Ikea and Sonos cleverly disguised a Wi-Fi speaker in bland wall art.
Photo: Ikea

Ikea and Sonos unveiled their latest collaboration recently — a Symfonisk Wi-Fi speaker embedded in a picture frame that blends into your home’s decor. But sorry, you won’t be slipping your oil painting of Steve Jobs in there. It’s not actually a picture frame.

The device comes with black or white artwork you can fit onto the black or white frame as a sort of grille like you’d find, you know, covering a speaker. Behind that cover lurks a woofer and tweeter combination.

Artist Jennifer Idrizi created the cover design, which Ikea noted found inspiration in cymatics, or a visualization of sound vibrations. Alternatively, the company offers a pair of replacement panels with different designs, at $20 apiece.

Symfonisk speaker works AirPlay 2

Ikea and Sonos have collaborated on Symfonisk speakers for three years, though this is the first one to blend in as artwork. They also have “table lamps” covered.

You can hang the frame on a wall or flip out its stabilizing feet to set it on a surface and lean it against a wall or something else. The feet can help reduce vibration and rattle.

The device’s design allows you to route the power cord off to one side of the frame or the other. On one side you also find play/pause and volume buttons.

As with older collaborations between Ikea and Sonos, the picture frame Wi-Fi speaker works like any Sonos speaker. You can pair the frame with other Sonos or Ikea speakers, use the Sonos S2 app to run 100 different streaming services and send audio to the frame with AirPlay 2 or Spotify Connect. You can pair two frames and run them in stereo, as well.

Price: $199.99 for the picture frame and covers; two additional covers are $19.99 each.

Where to buy: Ikea

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