This studio complex has an illustrious history stretching back to 1978, but after being rescued from bankruptcy by a team including Dutch recording engineer Ronald Prent and mastering specialist Darcy Proper in mid-2010, it spent much of the following 15 months undergoing extensive refurbishment, including major structural work and the installation of two PMC surround monitoring systems in the two main studio control rooms. The Studio 1 control room opened for mixing sessions at the end of October, and work in the studio’s recording area was completed just before Christmas, ready for a series of vocal sessions booked for a major Dutch artist in January. The control room in the other main studio, Studio 2, was also completed before the festive period, work concluding with the tuning of the PMC 5.1 monitoring (a duplicate of the full-range system in Studio 1).

As recording engineer turned Wisseloord Creative Director Ronald Prent makes clear, some of the work was restoration, some completely new building. "The control rooms had to be completely rebuilt, because they were too small for surround, and this facility has to be able to cope with surround, up to 10.1 if needed." With this in mind, Studios 1 and 2 each feature a state-of-the-art PMC 5.1 active monitoring system comprising three of PMC’s BB5-XBD-A speakers, the most powerful in their range, a pair of MB2S-XBD on the rear surrounds, and a set of the smaller active AML2 speakers for reference. AML2s are also used for reference in the new mastering suite built for Darcy Proper.