Aiaiai Capital headphones propel Danish design momentum

It's already been a great year for the Danish headphone designers over at Aiaiai, and it's about to get even better.

The company's TMA-1 DJ headphones recently earned a spot in an exhibit at SFMOMA documenting contemporary industrial designs influenced by Dieter Rams, and its latest headphones, the Capital, are already garnering shrieks of schoolgirl glee from audiophiles who appreciate equal parts form and function.

Aiaiai supplied the audio technology for the Capital headphones, but once again leaned on Scandinavian design group Kibisi to design their form. The two made a great first impression last year with the release of the Tracks supra-aural headphones, and Kibisi's simple design ethos is made clear again in the Capital.

I think this is the first time I've ever seen the word "fiberglass" used to describe a headphone, but Aiaiai tells me it used fiberglass-reinforced nylon and a lightweight rubber headband to build the over-ears, with a hardened focus on durability. Along the same lines, the ratcheting ear cup adjustments look similar to snowboard boot bindings, with a folding mechanism that flattens the earpieces against each other, something like the Marshall Major headphones.

I haven't had a chance to take a listen to them yet, but their $110 price tag makes me suspect their sonic strength will fall somewhere between the Tracks over-ears and the full-size TMA-1 DJ cans. Look for an official release date coming soon, followed by a rated review on CNET.com.