Bookshelf Speakers — Nime Audio Design Poetica

The Poetica is a three-way ported loudspeaker from Nime Audio Design, the Italian brand founded by Nico Memoli. The concept behind the company started in 2010, and its first official public appearance came in 2012 at the Hi-Fidelity show in Rome. Nime presents itself as a union of recognised Italian design with high performance hi-fi reproduction. Unlike the earlier two-way models of the range, the Poetica adds a dedicated midrange driver, and it is supplied as a speaker body that sits on its own matching stand.

Key specs that matter

Every driver in the Poetica is sourced from Accuton, the German maker also known as Thiel and Partner. A 220 mm ceramic cone is the woofer, a 158 mm ceramic cone handles mids and a 25 mm ceramic dome handles the treble. The published response is 34 Hz to 25,000 Hz, sensitivity is 90 dB and nominal impedance is 8 ohm. The speaker body measures 59 cm high, 30 cm wide and 49 cm deep, and the stand has the same footprint at 51 cm high, so the complete assembly stands 110 cm tall. Weight is 48 kg net per loudspeaker including the stand.

Engineering and use context

Nime builds the cabinet walls from a 40 mm thick high density composite chosen for its damping behaviour. Nime uses an asymmetrical layout on the front baffle, with the woofer centred on the front while the midrange and tweeter sit together in their own compartment in an opposite corner. Because that upper compartment can be mounted toward the inside or outside edge, left and right speakers can be arranged as a mirrored pair with the tweeters placed where the owner prefers. The irregular cabinet shape is intended to reduce internal diffraction and distortion. Inside, the crossover uses Mundorf Mcap Supreme capacitors and Mundorf copper foil inductors, and the binding posts are by WBT. Treating the stand as part of the design means the drivers are fixed at the height the designer intended rather than at the height of a generic stand.

Pairing

The benign nominal load together with the high sensitivity lets the Poetica work with many kinds of amplifier, from moderate valve designs to larger solid state units. With ceramic drivers in every band, low noise electronics and sources are a sensible choice, and a room of about 20 m2 suits the size of the complete speaker.

Alternatives

The Nime Audio Design Elite One is the brand's two-way stand mount, with a 7 inch Accuton ceramic mid woofer and a 1 inch Accuton ceramic dome in a solid 10 mm steel cabinet.