Sarah Nicolls, a concert pianist from Stroud, has developed a novel vertical grand piano designed to enhance both player interaction and audience experience by making all 210 strings visible and easily accessible. The prototype, weighing just 60 kilograms, represents a significant reduction from the typical 200 kilograms of a conventional grand piano.

Nicolls embarked on this project out of frustration with the limitations of traditional piano designs, especially when performing contemporary classical pieces that require plucking and strumming of the strings. “Composers were asking me to reach into the piano to produce different sound effects,” she explained. However, doing so on standard grand pianos was uncomfortable for performers and visually restrictive for audiences, who could not see the string manipulations. These challenges prompted Nicolls to rethink the instrument’s form.

Her research led her to historical long-necked upright pianos, such as the Giraffe, which oriented the strings vertically but were prone to instability due to the massive cast iron frames needed to withstand string tension—estimated at around 20 tonnes. The traditional cast iron components, critical to sustaining tension and durability, have remained largely unchanged since being patented two centuries ago. To overcome this, Nicolls explored modern materials, ultimately substituting the heavy iron frame with carbon fiber, drastically reducing the instrument’s weight and improving its stability.

The redesign featured collaboration with a range of experts, including structural engineers at Atelier One, material specialists, and piano technicians. Nicolls emphasized the importance of maintaining stringent design parameters, such as ensuring the string interface remained as accessible as the keyboard. The vertical alignment of the strings also offers acoustic advantages by projecting sound toward the listener’s ears directly, likened by Nicolls to positioning quality speakers on a shelf rather than beneath a table or inside a cupboard.

The piano’s lighter weight and unique configuration are expected to appeal especially to home users, addressing common issues related to the size and mass of traditional pianos that limit portability and accessibility. Nicolls noted a rising enthusiasm among younger musicians fascinated by the instrument’s interior mechanics, reinforced by the growing popularity of pianos in public spaces and media.

Nicolls plans to begin commercial sales of the piano next year and is currently seeking additional investment to complete the design and manufacture process. Neil Thomas, director of Atelier One, praised the project as a remarkable reinvention of the piano, combining Nicolls’s musical expertise with 21st-century engineering and materials. Piano technician Dan Carney, who contributed to stringing the prototype, described its sound as rich and full of harmonics, noting that despite its compact size, the instrument did not compromise on tonal quality or sustain.

Nicolls described the development process as “an astonishing adventure” driven by her passion for the piano and expressed optimism about the instrument’s potential to inspire future generations of musicians.