Sonus Faber Olympica Nova 1
The Sonus Faber Olympica Nova 1 ($6500/pair) is the company’s latest stand-mounted, two-way monitor—a lineage that began with their first speaker, the Minima, which I reviewed some 24 years ago.1 Like the products that followed, the Minima featured a 1" silk-dome tweeter and a 4" reflex-loaded paper based midbass driver, both attached to a leather-covered baffle and housed in a beautiful wood cabinet, hand-crafted in Italy. I enjoyed the Minima’s sound, as did this magazine’s Sam Tellig, who praised its “sweet, forgiving, slightly rolled off on top, and somewhat ripe … mid-to-upper bass,” with superb focus and imaging that was a “treat for sore ears.”2 I recalled fondly that tiny monitor’s imaging and midrange smoothness, so when offered the chance to review the Minima’s 2019 descendent, I readily accepted.
Design
The Olympica Nova 1 was designed by Sonus Faber’s Paolo Tezzon and shares many features with the $15,900/pair Guarneri Tradition so well described in John Atkinson’s March 2018 review. For example, the Olympica Nova 1’s newly designed cabinet walls are
