My journey to owning a pair of Westminster Royal SEs started like this: Quite a few years ago at the Consumer Electronics Show I heard a pair of Tannoy Churchill loudspeakers and they really impressed me. They had gorgeous tone and produced a visceral impact that I could feel over my entire body, and I was never able to get that experience out of my head. The Churchill is now a footnote in Tannoy’s history, but in any event, I had fixed my sights on the Westminster Royal SE, Tannoy's premier and most revered loudspeaker. "Hey, if the Churchill was that awesome, the Westminster Royal SE must even be more awesome," was my logic and hope.

So I did what a lot of us have to do with exotic Hi-Fi equipment that's not easy to audition due to their scarcity, I ordered a pair without having heard them and hoped for the best. That's a little scary when you're talking about a loudspeaker that sells for about what I paid for my Toyota 4Runner.

Tannoy makes each pair of Westminster Royal SEs as an order is received, so it takes a while from the time you place an order until they make your pair and ship them. I settled in for the long wait for Tannoy to make my Westminster Royal SEs and deliver them to me in the USA from their factory in Coatbridge, Scotland ... more to come.