Building TV cabinet; should I use wall speakers or bookshelf type speakers behind fabric?

In the old days, to verify if a fabric was ok in front of speakers, we would blow cigarette smoke thru the fabric, see and feel the resistance.

a sample corner, the fabric would get stained from the smoke quite easily, sure glad I quit.

@elliottbnewcombjr ,
 

Well that's one way of doing it!

I'm assuming the BBC, after trying a different experiment, decided to use Tygan for their legendary LS3/5s.

However, there must be other sonically transparent grille materials out there.

You just breathe thru it, easy? OK. no visual help from smoke these days unless my friend David is around, I just realized, happily he is the only friend I have who still smokes (happily meaning myself and all other friends quit).

btw, Smoking Money became good 4 me.

I quit when I was 40 (73 now). Decided to give myself a treat with my tobacco money, spent that amount on music and/or music equipment: carton a week was $700./year in 1988.

I wasn’t thinking long, just encouragement not to go back to smoking as I had so many times before. Never imagined how it might add up.

Gave myself a rise in pay along the way, each year, whatever a carton a week cost, up to $4,200/yr now.

Any insurance actuary here who can approximate what these 33 years has added up to $ _____?

Somewhere around $80,000. ?