Combining a design whiteboard with acoustic panels in one wall

The writable area and the acoustic area compete for the same wall space, so the first decision is how much each genuinely needs. A room used mainly for calls and focused work may need more acoustic coverage, while a workshop-heavy space may need to prioritise the writing surface and treat acoustic panels as a secondary element. Getting this split wrong in either direction tends to surface within the first few weeks of use, once a team either runs out of writing space or finds the acoustic treatment noticeably insufficient for the room. A simple starting point is to measure how the room is currently used before assuming a fixed split, since actual usage patterns often differ from what a floor plan alone would suggest.

Acoustic performance also scales with how the panels are mounted rather than thickness alone: moving a panel out on a small air gap from the wall, rather than fixing it flush, meaningfully increases sound absorption, which is worth factoring in before deciding how much wall area to allocate to each element.

A design whiteboard and acoustic panels rarely come from the same material family, since one needs a hard, smooth surface and the other needs a soft, sound-absorbing one. Coordinating colour and frame detailing across both, rather than trying to match the material itself, is usually what makes the wall read as one composition. A useful test is to look at the wall from across the room rather than up close. From a distance, colour and proportion do more to unify the composition than the materials matching exactly. Samples viewed under the room’s actual lighting, rather than under showroom conditions, tend to give a more reliable sense of how the finished combination will look once installed.

Chameleon’s PET-felt acoustic panels come in 23 colours, which gives enough range to pick a tone that sits alongside a SatinTones or ceramic steel whiteboard finish rather than clashing with it, even when the two materials are mounted directly next to each other on the same wall.

Placing the whiteboard at a consistent height relative to the surrounding acoustic panels, rather than centring it independently, keeps the layout looking intentional. This is typically decided alongside the room’s furniture layout so sightlines to the board are not blocked. This is also where furniture layout and the whiteboard’s position need to be considered together, since a board that reads well on an empty wall can still end up partially blocked once desks or seating are added. Sightlines from the most commonly used seating position in the room are worth checking specifically, rather than assessing the wall only from the doorway or a generic viewpoint.

The most successful combined walls rarely divide the surface into equal halves. In practice, architects often use larger writable zones where active planning and workshop activity take place, while acoustic sections are positioned around seating areas, circulation zones or spaces intended for quieter discussion. The combination works best when each material supports a different mode of collaboration rather than simply sharing the same wall.

Mounting the whiteboard and acoustic panels onto a shared backing layer, rather than fixing each directly to the wall, makes it easier to keep the surfaces flush and simplifies future adjustments if the room layout changes. A shared substrate also simplifies cable management where the wall needs to accommodate screens or lighting alongside the acoustic and writable elements. This approach also makes it considerably easier to remove or reposition either element later, without needing to patch and refinish the wall behind it.

Because this combination touches both acoustic performance and visual design, involving an interior architect at the specification stage, rather than after the whiteboard has already been ordered, avoids rework on sizing or finish later. Even a short conversation at the concept stage is usually enough to avoid the more expensive fixes that come from resizing either element after installation has already begun. This is particularly true where the wall in question also needs to accommodate power outlets, data points or signage, since all of these elements compete for the same limited space. In our experience, the projects that go most smoothly are the ones where this conversation happens before either the acoustic panels or the whiteboard have been ordered.

Done well, this kind of wall supports both quiet, focused work and shared visual visibility without either function being compromised by the other. The acoustic performance and the collaborative planning surface end up reading as one architectural decision, rather than two separate additions competing for the same square metres. Projects that get this right tend to treat the wall as a single design brief from the outset, with acoustic performance and writable area specified together rather than negotiated separately once budgets and timelines are already fixed.

Does adding acoustic panels next to a whiteboard reduce its usable writing area?

Can a design whiteboard and acoustic panels be installed at different times?

Do acoustic panels need to match the colour of the whiteboard frame?

Who typically specifies a combined whiteboard and acoustic panel wall?

Is a shared mounting substrate necessary for this combination?

Explore how integrated writable and acoustic wall systems can support both collaboration and acoustic comfort within contemporary office interiors, using design whiteboard as the writable element.