Embarrassed....Audio furniture help


Well, I swore I'd never let a woman dictate my two channel system but here we are.  Wife and I bought our first new home, I've got a small but adequate second living area for my system.  Problem is, as mentioned, my wife.  Setup will consist of CD player, AppleTV unit and integrated amp.  May add a streamer at some point but we'll cross that bridge later.  I'm using a pair of bookshelves and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

Here's the rub....She is demanding an A/V credenza, so speakers sitting on the credenza on either side of the TV.  Of course I'd love a vertical audio stand and be able to use speaker stands but it's too open, too many exposed cables, blah blah, you know the story.  

Question of the day:  can anyone point me in the right direction?  I need minimum 18" depth and all the awful Crate and Barrel stuff she recommends isn't up to my audio standards.  Needs something with doors for a clean look but I still need my IR signal to work.  Because the speakers aren't going on stands, I'd like something at least 20" tall.  A lot of the fashionable stuff is 14-16" tall, putting the tweeters way below ear level in the listening position.  

Any help would be much appreciated.  

Sincerely,

Man shaking his head with a borderline resigned look


cjlundberg
Your audio furniture may be your smallest problem. Demands usually grow. Good luck.
I am on my third wife, my current wife is on her third husband, don't sweat it, enjoy your life, there are a lot more fishes in the sea. 
Hey, I used a company called stand out designs. They are no longer building AV cabinets due to COVID. One of the craftsmen Brian is doing it on his own. His website is Bawoodworksllc.com. They are great people to work with. 
I bought six solid oak LP shelves from Maple Shade. Then put some nice white oak euro ply on top and in two of the LP spaces I drilled some holes for shelf standards and now I have 4 shelves for the AV equipment and speakers.

The other 4 spaces are for LPs...and this is on the side wall. The short wall gets 4 LP shelf units for my audio rack and The rest of the LPs. This was my solution as my wife and I moved into a new place last year and I had to get creative with room layout in a smaller home.

Don't relent. Let her know how important music is to you and work with her to come up with something that works for both of you.

One concession my wife made was that we don't have any reflective surfaces (portraits or artwork behind glass) in the living room. My concession was a 60" TV. I put a felt blanket over it when I listen to music.



Salamander. Buy it viaAmazon prime for the free shipping. I have one in the tv room that is built to accommodate a sound bar. I ditched the sound bar and put in two speakers instead.  Sounded boxy til I lined the shelf with sound absorbing foam, added poly fill behind the speakers, and put the speakers on IsoAcoustic pucks. Tucked a subwoofer in the corner and it sounds pretty decent and no cables visible except the sub.