Focal Utopia by Tournaire are world's most expensive headphones

Just when we thought we'd seen the most expensive headphones at CES 2017, in the form of Onkyo's €80,000 diamond-encrusted H900Ms, along comes French hi-fi specialist Focal with something considerably pricier - its $120,000 Utopia by Tournaire.

Maison Tournaire is a master jeweller run by father and son Philippe and Mathieu Tournaire. They have created a bespoke design for Focal based on the mark of the Trilogy, the symbol of the Tournaire jewellers, which represents the three stages of life: the past, present and future.

The design uses 18 carat gold mounted with six carats of diamonds, all hand crafted in Tournaire's workshops.

"Utopia by Tournaire is the fruit of a unique partnership - the perfect symbiosis of Focal, a manufacturer of high-fidelity speaker drivers and loudspeakers for more than 35 years, and Tournaire, a jeweller renowned for its symbolic and atypical jewellery,” says Sébastien Dumas, Focal brand and communication director.

A portion of the profits from the sales of the Utopia by Tournaire headphones and stand will be donated to the P’tit Louis association, dedicated to saving eight-year-old Louis Biscini who suffers from a rare degenerative disease, spinal muscular atrophy type 1.

MORE: Onkyo adds 20 carat diamonds to its H900M headphones

Andy Clough

Andy is Global Brand Director of What Hi-Fi? and has been a technology journalist for 30 years. During that time he has covered everything from VHS and Betamax, MiniDisc and DCC to CDi, Laserdisc and 3D TV, and any number of other formats that have come and gone. He loves nothing better than a good old format war. Andy edited several hi-fi and home cinema magazines before relaunching whathifi.com in 2008 and helping turn it into the global success it is today. When not listening to music or watching TV, he spends far too much of his time reading about cars he can't afford to buy.