Crossway Recording Studio

After spending several years working in and around New York City, producer, musician, and Sweetwater customer Hal Cohen and his wife Hilda were in the market for a new home. Hal had a Logic-based home studio filled with a plethora of instruments and outboard gear, but he had outgrown his space and was looking to expand.

One day, his realtor called with exciting news: “I found a beautiful listing in Mendham, NJ. It looks like it has some sort of studio in it, but it’s hard to tell.” The family had just put the property on the market, and it was unclear if they knew what they had. From the real estate listing photos, the studio space appeared to have been converted into a TV room with a couch and exercise bike. Hal immediately drove to Mendham, and upon realizing what he’d discovered, he purchased the property on the spot.

Thrilled with his new find, Hal called his Sweetwater Sales Engineer, David Mikautadze, to share the news. After looking at a couple of photos, David instantly recognized what Hal had acquired: a Russ Berger-designed studio. David was very familiar with Berger’s work, as the Russ Berger Design Group (RBDG) had designed all the technical facilities at Sweetwater, including Sweetwater Studios, the video production rooms, the Performance Theatre, and several parts of the retail store. On David’s recommendation, Hal reached out to Russ to restore the room to its former glory. Little did Hal know, the studio had a fascinating backstory!

A Long Time Ago...

In 1993, Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown, and their daughter Bobbi Kristina lived on five acres in a quiet, heavily wooded neighborhood in Mendham, NJ. They had built a studio in their primary residence, but it was too small and not referencing properly. Soon after, they purchased an adjoining five-acre property with a three-bedroom house to use as a guest house and recording studio. Based on their positive experiences at Patchwerk Studios in Atlanta, GA, and Sony Music in New York City — both designed by Russ Berger Design Group — they contacted RBDG to be the acoustical designers and architects for the project.

According to Russ, “Our challenge was to create a space that fit the individual and different ways Whitney and Bobby worked in the studio, to inspire their creative expression, and to achieve industry-standard reference performance and function.”

A hallmark of RBDG is the side-looking control room. However, Russ continues, “Site constraints and existing conditions of the residence inspired a particularly unique design solution, both architecturally and acoustically.”

The final 1,100-square-foot studio featured the first 96-input Solid State Logic 9J-equipped control room with bespoke stereo Quested monitors. It also had a spacious tracking room with a piano iso room that opened onto the studio and support space. The original stereo monitor configuration flanked two giant, 19-inch CRT screens, which Russ now jokingly calls “state of the arc.”

For over two decades, the studio was responsible for numerous Whitney and Bobby recordings, including Whitney’s “Step by Step,” “It’s Not Right, but It’s Okay,” and the Babyface-produced single “Why Does It Hurt So Bad” from the blockbuster movie Waiting to Exhale. Sadly, Whitney passed away in 2012.

Eventually, the studio was gutted, and the property was sold to a family with young kids. The new owners left the studio’s structural and architectural features intact, but the technical millwork and acoustical finishes were removed and replaced with drywall.

Version 2.0

All of the people at RBDG were excited to revisit the studio to restore the acoustical finishes, refresh the interiors, and tackle the challenge of upgrading the space to a referenced and calibrated Dolby Atmos mix environment. Overall, the new design stays close to the original but with a few updates to accommodate modern technology.

This included replacing the Limp Mass Traps (LMT) that flanked the console, allowing sight lines to the entry and machine room and, most importantly, providing a view into the studio. The LMTs, combined with the 12-foot-wide sloped 0.75-inch sound-rated laminated glass control, reflected sound from the monitors back into the mix position while allowing a clear view of the studio.

The custom architectural millwork was rebuilt from the original plans, including the standalone patchbay at the entry and the producer’s desk behind the console, which features a stunning shattered-glass inlay.

Fortunately, much of the original design remained intact. The sound isolation shell and quiet HVAC systems continue to provide below-threshold-of-hearing background noise levels. The heated purple slate floor inlay in the studio gently warms the space (Whitney liked to record in stocking feet). The light maple floors required minimal refinishing. The large, architectural acoustic beam element that diagonally transects the control room and studio still effectively traps low-frequency energy in the control room and elegantly divides the studio and piano room. The clerestory windows still illuminate the space with soft north light.

Best of all, it doesn’t look like a room designed in the early 1990s. All the people at RBDG pride themselves on timeless designs.

The Gear

Over the years, Hal had various iterations of a home studio. With David’s help, his equipment collection had grown significantly. When it came time to begin the renovation, he had all the classic outboard gear covered, including a Tube-Tech CL 1B, Manley SLAM!, Manley Massive Passive, Maag Audio EQ4M, two channels of Focusrite Red, a Rupert Neve Designs 517, two channels of Rupert Neve Designs 5052, a Universal Audio 2-610, Focusrite ISA430 MKII, two API 3124MVs, a Chandler TG2-500, Avalon VT-737sp, Bricasti M7, Eventide H9000, TC Electronic M3000, Teletronix LA-2A, two channels of Universal Audio 1176LN, a Solid State Logic Fusion, four Empirical Labs EL8-X Distressors, an API 2500+, Rupert Neve Designs Master Buss Processor, two API 5500s, and two API 550As — the list goes on and on. In addition to all the outboard gear, Hal also had an extensive microphone and instrument collection, including two Yamaha Disklavier grand pianos.

The one thing Hal had yet to acquire was a large-frame control surface. After a bit of back and forth, he and David settled on a 48-channel Avid S6 with four Avid MTRX II units, each with 64 channels of analog I/O. Even though Hal had been a longtime Logic user, Pro Tools was also going to play a big part in his new space, not only for Atmos but for interfacing with new clients.

Dolby Atmos

The room was originally designed for stereo, so converting it to Dolby Atmos presented its own considerations.

As part of the immersive upgrade, RBDG decided to rebuild the front monitor configuration like a small dub stage — a screen wall with LCR (left, center, right) and LFE (low-frequency effects) speakers behind an acoustically transparent projection screen.

They were pleased that only minimal acoustical changes were required to accommodate the addition of the lateral and overhead immersive surround array. The existing sound isolation shell provided an adequate mounting structure for the immersive speaker array.

Now Hear This!

Given the configuration, it was evident that a surround array that could provide broad coverage at a high output level was needed. Hal, Russ, and I chose Danley Sound Labs.

Hal selected a 7.1.4 system comprised of Danley Sound Labs HRE1 speakers for the LCR, and their amps were removed from the speakers and rackmounted in the machine room. Four Danley Sound Labs SM90 speakers are used for the height speakers, four SM60 models for the surrounds, and two tower-size DTS20 subs for the LFE, all powered by Danley DSA 750X4 amps.

Since there would be a screen wall, this demanded more than just high SPL; it required fidelity across the entire frequency range. The HRE1 is a beastly 4,400-watt, four-way powered studio monitor standing almost 55 inches tall. It has a maximum SPL of 132.3dB and a frequency-response range from 14Hz to 23.7kHz. Powered by a 4-channel amplifier that delivers 2,400 watts to two long-excursion woofers, 1,200 watts to two highly efficient 8-inch woofers, and 400 watts per section to the 5-inch coaxial mid/high driver, this configuration ensures that every frequency range is accurately reproduced to deliver a very balanced sound.

Hal also added a nearfield set of the Danley Sound Labs TDH-3s off the meter bridge of his Avid S6. The TDH-3 is a passive nearfield monitor that is currently gaining popularity in the professional studio market.

Wire It Up

In addition to the studio build, Hal required the assistance of an AV integrator. For many people with home studios, buying a piece of audio equipment means doing your own research, browsing online, and consulting your trusted Sweetwater Sales Engineer. Then, you purchase it, plug it in, and hit record.

Large recording studios typically require a lot more than that. They need a system design that includes not only audio but also technical aspects such as power, lighting, grounding, and networking. Then, all of that needs to be wired up.

For Crossway, it’s important to remember that all the audio and power conduits had been removed. So, Sweetwater Integration was brought in to handle the system design.

Formerly known as All Pro Sound, Sweetwater Integration is the technical integration division of Sweetwater Sound that works with Sweetwater Sales Engineers to design and integrate studios, stadiums, houses of worship, and more. The studio-focused Sweetwater Integration team for this project comprised Mark Salamone, Jason DeChristopher, and Brian Wharton.

The key to working with an integrator is to be proactive. Mark Salamone was looped in early on when putting together the team. Hal already owned a lot of equipment that had to be accounted for and implemented into the design.

Survey Says...

So, how does it sound? To quote Hal, “I thought the room sounded really, really good once the speakers were installed, but after the room got dialed in, I’m just blown away! Not only by how the room sounds but also by how the space looks!”

Despite its 1993 vintage, the room could have been designed in 2024, and no one would be the wiser. RBDG works hard to be one of the leaders in creating timeless-looking spaces — something that often gets overlooked when designing recording studios.

To let Hal have the final word: “I’m so excited to be making music, not only recording but mixing and composing. The Atmos environment is so inspiring. And the fact that this was Whitney Houston’s studio? I’m just so grateful.”

Hear It in Action

Don’t just read about Crossway, hear it in action along with in-depth interviews on how the whole process came together:

Crossway Recording Studio was nominated for Best Studio Design Project at the 2025 TEC Awards in Anaheim, CA. It can be found on the web at https://www.crosswaystudio.com.
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