If you prefer your headphones expensive and decked out in a menacingly handsome chrome and black finish, then Meze Audio’s new $6000 headphones are worthy of your attention.
Called the ARTA, the new flagship model sits at the very top of Meze’s range and is being pitched as the company’s most ambitious pair of headphones yet. Developed over several years in collaboration with Rinaro Isodynamics, it combines a rather striking sculptural design with a new planar magnetic driver that Meze says delivers its most immersive listening experience yet.
At the heart of the ARTA is the new Rinaro MZ5 HΩ driver. According to Meze, it’s the highest-impedance planar magnetic headphone driver ever created, operating at 225 ohms. The company says that its high-voltage, low-current design improves signal purity, stability, and linearity, helping deliver a more natural and realistic listening experience. We’ve yet to test it our for ourselves, mind, but it certainly sounds promising on paper.
Rather than purely chasing a ruthlessly analytical sound, Meze says it has tuned the ARTA with a warm-neutral character, and a presentation intended to feel closer to listening through a high-end speaker system. The company describes a wide, three-dimensional soundstage where instruments occupy clearly defined positions within the mix.
As for the bold supervillain-esque design. Meze says that it draws inspiration from both Art Nouveau and organic, bionic forms, resulting in a headphone that looks more like a piece of industrial sculpture than traditional audio equipment. Carbon fibre, leather, and precision-machined metal all feature heavily, as they should at this price point.
Some of these visual flourishes, by the way, also serve an acoustic purpose. The outer grille uses angled acoustic blades designed to reduce internal reflections, which Meze says helps produce cleaner transients and a more open sound. Neat.
Like the rest of Meze’s premium range, every major component – including the drivers, earcups, headband, and earpads – can be removed, serviced, or replaced, earning it major sustainability brownie points. The headphones are engineered and hand-assembled in Baia Mare, Romania, with the company positioning them as a product designed for long-term ownership rather than regular replacement.
As for other specs, Meze quotes a frequency response of 3Hz to 115kHz, total harmonic distortion below 0.05 per cent, and a weight of 495g.
Making its public debut at the High End Vienna show on 4 June, the ARTA is landing this summer, for $6000 / £6000 / €6000.
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