How people feel in a space is just as important as the room’s functionality. That’s why good conference room design should strive to blend audio video (AV) systems and hardware into an environment that keeps people engaged and comfortable.
We put together a short list of our favorite cool conference rooms to inspire your next AV integration. We’ll walk you through how we went about designing these rooms for style as well as functionality.
3 Conference Room Design Examples To Inspire Your Next Installation
The conference room design tips in this article are based on three different designs, each of which required solving unique problems. In each example, we’ll include conference room design photos and descriptions of the equipment used to bring each room to life.
Kay Electric Cooperative
Kay Electric Cooperative’s mission is to provide expert electrical installation with safety and value in mind. Its meeting space has been included as one of the best conference room designs because of the way they solved some challenges very specific to their needs.
Their conference room is a long, narrow, executive-style board room that includes two additional tables in the back of the room to accommodate more people.
Their intention for this 30-person conference room was to use it as a cooperative space, or co-op. They also needed to accommodate a virtual audience and find a solution to view people at the other end of the room all at once.
These requirements posed a challenge. The length of the room meant they would need more than one camera so that virtual participants could view everyone present. They also needed multiple displays to allow viewing of other in-person participants, video content, or presentations regardless of where attendees are seated.
To solve this problem, the experts at Aspen Custom Electronics installed a camera at the back and front of the room, and placed each display strategically so participants can view content from any seat.
It was also important to Kay Electric Cooperative that those using the room would be able to see presentations or video content as well as virtual participants simultaneously. This is known as a multi-viewer set-up, and allows content to be displayed beside Zoom (or the video conferencing tool of your choice).
This creates an environment where you can always see people on the far side of the room, those participating virtually, and video content or presentations all at once on any combination of displays throughout the room.
Ultimately, the design of this conference room included multiple multi-viewer systems, connected to several different computers and video sources to achieve these goals.
Finally, to pick up sound from around the room, Aspen Custom Electronics installed a Sennheiser in-ceiling microphone.
Eskimo Joe’s Promotional Products Group (EJPPG)
EJPPG is a full-service restaurant and clothing line that is recognized worldwide. Their conference room needs demanded a modern design—they wanted a flexible space that could easily serve as one large conference room, or two smaller huddle rooms.
To achieve this goal, they needed to construct a divisible wall in the center of their 20 person conference room. They also needed to outfit the room with equipment that was appropriate for use in either scenario—for a large group or two small groups.
To make that happen, the experts at Aspen Custom Electronics installed two of Shure’s MXA 310 microphones, one on the ceiling in each of the smaller rooms. These microphones were then connected to a Biamp DSP, which allowed the microphones to be used separately or as one.
A display was also installed in each room, so that when the room is used as one cohesive space, it looks like there’s meant to be a display at each end. When used as one room, the second camera switches off, and video from one camera is distributed to both displays. The video for the displays is distributed by a Crestron NVX sys.
Finally, both rooms were outfitted with a touch panel to easily split the room or combine it, depending on the user’s immediate needs.
Aspen Custom Electronics
We’d be remiss if we didn’t share our own conference room here at Aspen Custom Electronics, which is designed using Audio-Visual over Internet Protocol (AV over IP) technology.
While the conference room itself seats up to 12 people, our Crestron DM NVX AV over IP system allows us to distribute video throughout several different locations in our office over a network connection.
This allows us to host meetings or stream content to several different conference rooms at once, allowing participants to spread out and safely socially distance.
We can control all the technology in our conference room—power, audio, video, wireless presentations and much more— via a Crestron system touch panel on the wall.
The design of our conference room includes a ceiling microphone to minimize clutter on our tables and reduce sound interference when hosting video conferences. Those presenting can choose to present wirelessly using Clickshare, or by connecting their computer to the system using a high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI) cable, depending on their preference.
A camera and HDMI wall plate connect to our television display, and four speakers throughout the room. When a new input is plugged into the wall plate, the video switch automatically displays the video or content from that input.
What do all these conference rooms have in common? Virtual Video Conferencing Technology
A common theme for many of our clients—and shown in each of the conference rooms above—is the need to accommodate virtual or hybrid participants post-COVID. We expect to see the need for smaller, more flexible conference rooms to grow, and would recommend taking this into consideration when designing your next conference room space.
Whatever your specific needs, Aspen Custom Electronics can help. Reach out to us to talk about how we can help design the best conference room for your specific needs.
