LED Wallpaper
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

LED wallpaper is the integration of
light-emitting diodes A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...
into flat substrates suitable to be applied to walls for
interior decoration Interior design is the art and science of enhancing the interior of a building to achieve a healthier and more aesthetically pleasing environment for the people using the space. With a keen eye for detail and a creative flair, an interior d ...
purposes. The experimentation on the combination of light sources and wall covering surfaces has been largely fostered by the progressive miniaturisation of low-voltage lighting technology, such as
LEDs A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (correspo ...
and
OLEDs An organic light-emitting diode (OLED), also known as organic electroluminescent (organic EL) diode, is a type of light-emitting diode (LED) in which the emissive electroluminescent layer is an organic compound film that emits light in respons ...
, suitable to be incorporated into low-thickness materials to be applied onto interior walls. The new possibilities offered by these developments have prompted some designers and companies to research and develop proprietary LED wallpaper technologies, some of which are currently available for commercial purchase. Other solutions mainly exist as prototypes or are in the process of being further refined. The first use of the term ''LED wallpaper'' is found in the book ''Wallpaper'' by Lachlan Blackley, describing the work of textile designer Maria Yaschuk, who designed a flexible solution to incorporate LEDs into digitally printed wall covering material in 2004. This definition is currently used by companies such as
Meystyle Meystyle LED wallpaper & Fabric is a London-based company who specialise in designing and manufacturing bespoke wallpaper with the added feature of integrated light-emitting diodes. The company was initiated in 2004 as a collaboration between si ...
and designer
Ingo Maurer Ingo Maurer (12 May 1932 – 21 October 2019) was a German industrial designer who specialised in the design of lamps and light installations. He was nicknamed "poet of light". Life Maurer was born in Reichenau Island, Lake Constance, Germ ...
in relation to LED wall covering materials included in their catalogues. Other similar concepts are ''light-emitting wallpaper'' used by Lomox and ''luminous textile'' used by
Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), simply branded Philips, is a Dutch multinational health technology company that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, its world headquarters have been situated in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarter ...
.


Meystyle

Meystyle Meystyle LED wallpaper & Fabric is a London-based company who specialise in designing and manufacturing bespoke wallpaper with the added feature of integrated light-emitting diodes. The company was initiated in 2004 as a collaboration between si ...
claim to have been the first company to integrate light-emitting diodes into
wallpaper Wallpaper is used in interior decoration to cover the interior walls of domestic and public buildings. It is usually sold in rolls and is applied onto a wall using wallpaper paste. Wallpapers can come plain as "lining paper" to help cover uneve ...
so that it can be hung like a traditional wall covering. Maria Yaschuk, co-founder of the company together with sister Ekaterina Yaschuk, presented the first prototype of LED wallpaper as part of her graduation project for the MA degree in Textile Futures at CSM in 2004. The concept was successively developed with her sister Ekaterina into a series of designs exhibited in 2007 under the name Wire Geometrics at the National Glass Centre in Sunderland. The same year Maria and Ekaterina went on to commercialise their product under the company name Meystyle LED Wallpaper & Fabric. Meystyle uses digital printing to transfer their designs on a variety of non-woven substrates suitable for wall covering. The LEDs are then incorporated by hand with a special technique that avoids adding any thickness to the material. Meystyle claim their LED wallpaper can be hung like any standard wall covering with the additional requirement of a power socket or a light switch.


Living Wall by High-Low Tech

Living Wall is a project developed by
MIT Media Lab The MIT Media Lab is a research laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, growing out of MIT's Architecture Machine Group in the MIT School of Architecture and Planning, School of Architecture. Its research does not restrict to fi ...
research group High-Low Tech in 2009 as an experiment on interactive wallpaper that can be programmed to monitor its environment, control lighting and sound, and generally serve as an unobtrusive way to enrich environments. The wallpaper is flat, made entirely from paper and paint and is paired with a computing kit whose pieces can be customized with all manner of sensors, LED lamps, network interfaces, and interactive embellishments. The designers claim the pieces can be controlled by running the hand across the surface of the wallpaper. The Living Wall project was displayed at the
Fuller Craft Museum Fuller Craft Museum is an arts and crafts museum in the city of Brockton, Massachusetts, 25 miles south of Boston. It receives 20,000 visitors a year. It contains contemporary craft-based art of many different genres and origins. It is the onl ...
in
Brockton, Massachusetts Brockton is a city in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, United States; the population was 105,643 at the 2020 United States census. Along with Plymouth, Massachusetts, Plymouth, it is one of the two county seats of Plymouth County, Massachusetts, ...
from June to September 2010 as part of the exhibition New Materiality: Digital Dialogues at the Boundaries of Contemporary Craft.


LOMOX

In early 2010 the
Carbon Trust The Carbon Trust is a consultancy established in March 2001, with offices across the world. Its aim is to accelerate the pace of private and public sectors decarbonisation and increase energy efficiency in organisations worldwide. The Carbon ...
awarded a £454,000 grant to Welsh company LOMOX to develop a light emitting wallpaper using an ultra-efficient organic LED (
OLED An organic light-emitting diode (OLED), also known as organic electroluminescent (organic EL) diode, is a type of light-emitting diode (LED) in which the emissive electroluminescent layer is an organic compound film that emits light in respon ...
) technology that can be used as an even natural-looking light source for interior spaces in place of the more energy-demanding traditional lighting systems. The new technology was due for commercial release in 2012.


Ingo Maurer and Team

Together with
Meystyle Meystyle LED wallpaper & Fabric is a London-based company who specialise in designing and manufacturing bespoke wallpaper with the added feature of integrated light-emitting diodes. The company was initiated in 2004 as a collaboration between si ...
's,
Ingo Maurer Ingo Maurer (12 May 1932 – 21 October 2019) was a German industrial designer who specialised in the design of lamps and light installations. He was nicknamed "poet of light". Life Maurer was born in Reichenau Island, Lake Constance, Germ ...
's LED wallpaper is the only one currently available for commercial purchase. The LED wallpaper was designed by Ingo Maurer in partnership with Architects Paper in 2011 and is produced and distributed by Architects Paper. Maurer's wallpaper presents itself as a large electronic circuit board printed on paper and can be affixed to the wall with normal wallpaper adhesive. The conducting paths printed on the matte non-woven substrate become part of the design, on top of which are distributed white, red and blue LEDs. The red and blue diodes form optical cuboids with the white lights loosely and irregularly spread around them. The LEDs are controlled by a series of connection units which enables the individual regulation of the colours and the degrees of brightness of the LEDs. Silver-coloured skirting boards join the wallpaper to the floor and hide the technical equipment behind them.


Philips

In 2011
Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), simply branded Philips, is a Dutch multinational health technology company that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, its world headquarters have been situated in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarter ...
announced a partnership with Kvadrat Soft Cells to create a luminous textile which would combine Philips' experience in LED-based ambient lighting with Kvadrat Soft Cells' sound-absorbing textiles. The aim of the project is to enhance interior space through light and texture making full use of the broad spectrum of colours in Philips’ LED range. The textile is held in place with a lightweight
aluminum Aluminium (or aluminum in North American English) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Al and atomic number 13. It has a density lower than that of other common metals, about one-third that of steel. Aluminium has ...
frame that keeps it taut with the right amount of surface tension. The LED lights can be customised in a wide palette of colours that allow the final user to change the mood of the room whenever desired.


Alternative light-emitting wall covering solutions

There are some other examples of wall covering developments aimed at incorporating light-emitting technologies onto the surface of the walls that do not necessarily make use of light-emitting diodes. In 2007
Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...
designer Jonas Samson created a wall covering system with integrated lighting. The product appears to be regular wallpaper when the light is off and when illuminated can display light in any pattern or design. The design enables a room to be lit entirely by the walls. Turning the wallpaper on can be performed as a single action or can be set up in an elaborate sequence to make a space more dynamic and engaging. The designer has used phosphorescent pigments, transparent layers and a light switch to create a patterned wall with a botanical print powered by external light sources. In 2008
Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
designer Camilla Diedrich created a line of luminescent wallpaper that is lit by
fiber optics An optical fiber, or optical fibre, is a flexible glass or plastic fiber that can transmit light from one end to the other. Such fibers find wide usage in fiber-optic communications, where they permit transmission over longer distances and at ...
. The line is called Nature Ray Charles Wallpaper and consists of an assortment of floral motifs in eight colour variations. The floral patterns are made with the fiber optic itself and produce a soft energy-efficient ambient light. In 2012
Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
-based design company Flat Vernacular launched a line of wallpaper that can glow in the dark. Each glowing paper is printed using glow in the dark ink. The inks get charged by typical room lighting or sunlight and release a soft glow when the lights are turned off. In 2012, designer Debra Courtenay launched a project on the invention platform Quirky called ''Wallbrights''. The concept combines the idea of LED wallpaper and customisable wall decal and consists of a series of individual hexagonal shapes containing an
RGB The RGB color model is an additive color model in which the red, green, and blue primary colors of light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three ...
LED light with an adhesive backing that can be easily attached to the wall. The LED hexagonal decals can be composed into different patterns and shapes. Each component needs to be continuously connected to an adjacent one through their male/female connectors. The whole configuration can then be powered through a wall socket. The brightness and the colour of the lighting scheme can be adjusted through a
mobile app A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a smartphone, phone, tablet computer, tablet, or smartwatch, watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop appli ...
that communicates with the units via
Bluetooth Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is li ...
.


References

{{reflist LED lamps Wallcoverings Light-emitting diodes Optical diodes Paper products Printmaking