Chet Baker, Jessie Altman, eight around the table: Devialet Mania is fully charged. Launched in 2022 after four years of development, the Parisian maison’s first portable speaker diffuses 360° stereo sound. Using four microphones, it senses its surroundings to automatically adapt the acoustics to the room. From living room to kitchen to the edge of a table... It travels by its handle, lasting up to ten hours untethered.
Do we ever truly know our guests? Are we capable of hearing Magnus’s inner melody? Is Léa as melancholy as Vincent Delerm? Or Sofiane Pamart? Do we want our ideas to rise from the ambient noise, or from a "You Could Be More As You Are" playlist?
They haven’t arrived yet. But I can already hear their footsteps, somewhere in Paris. I set the table, dancing. A fork, a step. A candle, a spin. My heart flutters a little. Mania plays Dancing in the Kitchen; Jessie Altman sings of longing and sweetness.
Before we sit down, a brief history of sound. Devialet is born in Paris in 2007. Expert arrives in 2010, Phantom in 2015. Then, the house spends four years solving another puzzle: how to fit its signature acoustic profile into a speaker you can simply pick up and take with you.
The answer arrives in November 2022 with Mania, Devialet’s first portable speaker. Inside: four full-range speakers, two woofers, and four microphones. They sense where the speaker is placed and tune the rendering to its surroundings. Its cross-stereo architecture then diffuses the music in 360°, no matter where you stand.
To lose oneself between two conversations, three choruses. To grow drunk on a chord Magnus finds out of place—too bad for him. To hold Léa close. And Mania, a faithful new friend. Ten hours, at least (of battery life).
