Description
Dynaudio Contour Legacy floorstanding speaker pair
On display in the Helsinki store! 2 pairs left!
Read the review from LB Sound & Image magazine here!
Read the AVForums review here!
Modern. Classic.
Handmade with love in Denmark
Contour Legacy is the newest member of the Heritage Collection. Contour Legacy is a beautiful 2.5-way floorstanding speaker with a stunning finish reminiscent of the 2020 Heritage Special. It pays homage to the original Contour speakers of the 1980s and 1990s, but brings the technology into the modern era with Dynaudio’s driver expertise and the latest acoustic technologies.
It uses a state-of-the-art 28mm Esotar 3 soft dome tweeter (including a Hexis resonance-damping dome), two 18cm woofers derived from the classic Evidence series (tuned and improved to an even higher level), and an elegant crossover using selected premium components.
Contour Legacy is handcrafted at Dynaudio's headquarters in Skanderborg, Denmark, and finished in durable American walnut, with each veneer piece carefully selected and matched for each individual speaker.
The production batch is limited to 1000 numbered pairs worldwide, of which 15 pairs will be delivered to Finland!
Sit on the floor. Lean back in the chair, the record covers in your hands. Close your eyes and listen like you used to.
Contour Legacy is part of the Dynaudio Heritage collection. At the heart of it all is music. Durable quality. Nostalgia. It’s a powerful emotion that tugs at your heartstrings – and each of the limited edition 1000 pairs is proudly handmade in Denmark. Martin, Anne, Daniel, Claus and Kamil… have made them just for you.
It remasters Dynaudio's greatest hits – including improved Evidence Platinum woofers, the legendary Esotar 3 tweeters and a crossover that can only be described as a work of art. (Can you tell we're proud of our achievement?)
Run your hand over the eco-friendly American walnut veneer; admire the bevels, precisely cut to fractions of a degree; step back and realize that these friendly-looking speakers are packed with the latest in audio technology. (Then realize that the oldest thing in them is probably the music you're playing!)
That's okay. We're on the same wavelength: old is cool.
Reissue of a classic
The Contour Legacy is intended as a tribute to the late, iconic Contour 1.8 – and like its inspiration, there’s something special about it. It exudes a reassuring sense of pride and craftsmanship that’s perhaps lacking in today’s industrial world.
So you might be looking forward to a listening experience that will take you back to memories. Or Penny Lane.
But: this is even better. This is an update of memories.
Beneath the chocolate-toned American walnut veneer resides a whole new generation of technology. The original elements and electronics from the old Contour have been replaced with components that look familiar on the outside but sound significantly better.
As a Contour Legacy owner, you have permission to feel nostalgic, yet modern—whether you’re streaming or putting the needle in a vinyl groove. Let it go. Invite someone from the white plastic earbud generation to listen. Watch them immerse themselves in the music, track by track, forgetting about time and what they were doing.
Or you can decide not to invite anyone. You sit down in your favorite spot and remember what pure pleasure sounds like.
Marriage in Skanderborg
Each left and right Contour Legacy speaker is paired for life, like swans, and receives a partner the moment its components are carefully placed on our workbench in Jutland.
Each cabinet panel is made from a composite board of the same origin, just like a vineyard choosing a domaine. It is topped with a layer of durable, tactile, warm American walnut. Martin – a man with twenty years of experience in making Dynaudio speakers – selects these panels in pairs so that their wood grains look identical. This can only be achieved by a professional eye, it cannot be done by machines.
Contour Legacy is the result of passionate craftsmanship, a process that would be impossible to replicate with an anonymous robot in an anonymous factory.
That robot wouldn't squeeze every joint that our master gluer glues (yes, that's his real title), it wouldn't care about the precision of the joints cut to the hundredth of a degree. Nor would it care about how the weather affects the integrity of the joint angles (humans make sure the glue is completely finished at the end of the day to avoid unwanted changes).
It would not reject a pair of speakers because one of them had a defect that was almost invisible to the eye.
A robot wouldn't feel the sensation of lightly running your fingers over a small groove in the front panel. It wouldn't enjoy the smell of hardwood when the workshop doors open early in the morning, at the same time as the office computers.
Contour Legacy speakers take time to make – and are a bit obsessive – but the result is magical. Certain people appreciate that kind of quality.
As with all Dynaudio speakers, this obsession extends to the parts you don't see or pay attention to. Like the double-rounded bass reflex ports that control air flow and bass response, or the heavy and stable cast iron stand. There are no protruding feet on this speaker...
Our speaker designers had to convince two critical reviewers: their own ears
Dynaudio speaker designers don't see paying homage to a classic as a good reason to get out of bed. They need a challenge. The Contour Legacy provided just that.
Since the original Contour, speaker enclosures have generally become more sophisticated. They're designed to the point where you could be a Formula One team. They may not have been wind tunnel tested (although that has given us a few ideas), but they've definitely been the subject of thorough analysis.
Curved shapes and bends have found their way into the shapes of modern Dynaudio speakers, shaping and controlling pressure waves, reflections and refraction… guiding sound gracefully to its smiling, contented destination in your listening chair.
But part of what makes Contour Legacy speakers so soothing and familiar is their old-school rectangular shape. So how did our R&D team manage to get around this obstacle and still achieve such excellent results?
They modified the Evidence Platinum’s bass drivers by connecting them in parallel, with the lower one increasing the sensitivity of the upper one – the upper one handles mid and bass frequencies, while the lower one handles only bass frequencies. This meant they had to design a higher impedance voice coil. There were no off-the-shelf crossover solutions available for this particular choice, so the team designed a new crossover from scratch. They selected capacitors and connection cables from top European manufacturers such as Duelund, Mundorf and van den Hul. (Our engineers love this kind of snowball effect.)
Dynaudio Contour Legacy speakers represent a meticulous design and sound tuning journey that combines cutting-edge data-driven development with fine-tuning based on practical listening. The crown jewel of the speakers is the acclaimed Esotar 3 tweeter, renowned for its precision and clarity. Dynaudio designers spend around two weeks per development version, and around 70% of the changes to the speaker are made based on listening, not data.
The Jupiter measurement rig streamlines development, achieving in 20 minutes what would take days in other labs, allowing the team more time to tune by ear. In controlled, repeatable conditions, the speakers are tested using a wide range of music: from metal to classical, pop to world music – all through a high-quality player, DAC and amplifier.
Ultimately, the Contour Legacy is designed to shine in your listening space, where you'll experience its exceptional, long-lasting sound quality. It's worth every penny.
Specifications:
- Sensitivity: 90dB (2.83V/1m)
- IEC power rating: 200W
- Nominal impedance: 4 Ω
- Frequency response (± 3 dB): 42Hz–29kHz
- Operating principle: Bass reflex, pipe at the back
- Crossover: 2.5-way
- Crossover frequencies: (400)/3400Hz
- Crossover filter topology: first/second stage
- Woofer: 2x 18cm MSP cone
- Tweeter: 28mm Esotar 3
- Weight, pcs: 32.5 kg
- External dimensions (W x H x D): 208 x 995 x 345 mm
- External dimensions including legs and front grille (W x H x D): 208 x 995 x 352 mm
- Finish: American walnut
