Wharfedale - Denton 85th Anniversary Bookshelf Speakers (Pair)

A 13.5-litre hand-veneered box with a 6.5-inch Kevlar woofer and a woven textile dome — Wharfedale’s revival of the Denton, in the shape it has kept since Gilbert Briggs.

The Denton is Wharfedale’s oldest continuing idea. Gilbert Briggs started the company in the cellar of his house in Yorkshire in 1932, and the compact wooden Denton that followed became the speaker a great many British households actually owned. Wharfedale has revived it twice since — a Denton 80 in 2014, and this one, launched for the 85th anniversary — and each time the brief has been the same: keep the proportions and the veneer, rebuild everything inside.

What that means here is a 6.5-inch black woven Kevlar cone and a one-inch woven textile soft dome on a high-flux ferrite magnet, crossing over at 3.1kHz, in a 13.5-litre bass reflex cabinet with an inset front baffle and a Tungsten cloth grille. The cabinet is hand-veneered, not wrapped or painted, which at this size is most of what you are paying for and all of what you are looking at.

It is a 4Ω nominal design dropping to 3.8Ω minimum, so it wants an amplifier that is comfortable with a low load rather than the cheapest thing on the shelf. Wharfedale recommends 20 to 120 watts. Response is 45Hz to 20kHz within 3dB, with bass extension quoted separately at 40Hz down 6dB.

Worth knowing while you are choosing: Wharfedale currently sells four Dentons side by side — the Denton 80, this Denton 85, the larger Super Denton, and the new Denton 1S. The 1S is not a replacement for this speaker. It is a different design with a coaxial driver and a painted cabinet, drawing on the 1974 Denton 1 rather than on the Briggs-era original, and it sits at a lower price. If it is the veneer and the traditional two-way you want, this is the one.

Features

• 6.5-inch black woven Kevlar bass driver
• 1-inch woven textile soft dome with a high-flux ferrite magnet
• Hand-veneered cabinet with an inset front baffle
• Traditional Tungsten cloth grille
• 13.5-litre bass reflex enclosure
• Crossover at 3.1kHz
• 45Hz–20kHz ±3dB
• Sold as a pair

Specifications

• Type: Two-way vented-box standmount loudspeaker
• Sold as: A pair
• Wharfedale’s current name: Denton 85. The 85th Anniversary wording is how Wharfedale and the US distributor market it. Still a current product, sold alongside the Denton 80, Super Denton and Denton 1S
• Enclosure: Bass reflex. Wharfedale does not publish the port type or location for this model, and no third-party description of it was found either
• Bass driver: 6.5″ (165mm) black woven Kevlar cone. Chassis type not published
• Treble driver: 1″ (25mm) woven textile soft dome with a high-flux ferrite magnet. The magnet type appears in Wharfedale’s marketing copy rather than the spec table
• Crossover frequency: 3.1kHz. Slope not published
• Frequency response: 45Hz–20kHz ±3dB
• Bass extension: 40Hz at −6dB — a separate figure at a looser tolerance than the response spec, not to be merged with it
• Nominal impedance: 4Ω
• Minimum impedance: 3.8Ω
• Sensitivity: 88dB. Read the measurement condition, because Wharfedale’s is unusual and it matters when you compare speakers. Most makers quote sensitivity at 2.83V into one metre, or at one watt. Wharfedale quotes this one at 2.0V into one metre at a 4Ω nominal load. Note in particular that the Denton 1S also carries an 88dB figure but is measured at 2.83V into 8Ω — the two headline numbers look identical and are not comparable
• Recommended amplifier power: 20–120W
• Peak SPL: 95dB
• Cabinet volume: 13.5 litres
• Cabinet construction: Hand-veneered with an inset front baffle. Wharfedale names no internal bracing or damping material
• Binding posts and bi-wiring: Not published. Wharfedale’s manual PDF has no readable text layer, so the terminal type and bi-wiring support could not be confirmed
• Grille: Traditional Tungsten cloth. Attachment method not published
• Finishes: Wharfedale offers three: Walnut (listed as Antique Walnut on their UK site), Red Mahogany (Mahogany Red on the UK site) and Black Oak. We stock Walnut and Red Mahogany — ask us about Black Oak
• Dimensions: 340mm high on the plinth, 240mm wide, 287mm deep including terminals (275mm cabinet plus 12mm terminals). Whether the grille is included is not stated
• Weight: 9.0kg (19.8 lbs) per speaker
• Matching stands: None offered by Wharfedale for this model
• Country of manufacture: Not published. Wharfedale states no country of manufacture on the product page, in the manual, or on IAG’s corporate site — and IAG’s own Made in Britain page names only the Wharfedale Dovedale as UK-built. For what it is worth, Stereophile has quoted IAG’s director of acoustic design saying the Denton, Linton and Super Linton ranges are made at IAG’s own Ji’an factory in Jiangxi Province, China. That is a magazine reporting a manufacturer’s remark, not something Wharfedale publishes, and we are labelling it accordingly rather than printing it as a fact.