Photographer Creates Single-Image Art Photography Wallcoverings

In late 2014, celebrity photographer and designer Don Flood launched his first collection of FLIEPAPER art photography wallcoverings produced by Astek Wallcoverings. He followed that with the Palm Springs collection earlier this year.

Graphic and sophisticated, each FLIEPAPER art photography wallcovering is symphony of color, texture, and design with an emphasis on scale. Designs range from immense florals and bold textures to quirky, unexpected found objects. FLIEPAPER designs are digitally printed using an eco-friendly process and can be customized in color and design.

FLIEPAPER by Don Flood (www.fliepaper.com)
FLIEPAPER by Don Flood (www.fliepaper.com)

Flood’s FLIEPAPER designs have appeared in environments as varied as a high-end café in Santa Monica to a private elevator in a Redondo Beach luxury home.

Quartz art wallcovering
FLIEPAPER by Don Flood (www.fliepaper.com)

At the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) in May, Flood introduced his newest line of art photography wallcoverings called BIGS. Images in the BIGS collection include amethysts, minerals, crystals, sea coral, abalone, roses, sunflowers and butterflies.

FLIEPAPER art wallcovering
Crystal is part of the new BIGS collection of FLIEPAPER (www.fliepaper.com)

Inspired by the single-image wallcoverings of 1960s and 1970s interiors, Flood devised a proprietary process for shooting each subject in ultra-high-resolution and at very close range. He then had the images printed on a variety of new digitally printable wallcovering materials, including mylar. The results lend themselves to nearly any interior application from residential living rooms, dining rooms and bedrooms to commercial environments such as restaurants, office lobbies, and hotel public areas.

art wallcovering
This close-up photo of coral is part of the BIGS collection of FLIEPAPER. (www.fliepaper.com)

“We are very excited by what Don has created in BIGS,” said Aaron Kirsch, founder and CEO of Astek. “FLIEPAPER has proven popular with retail customers, interior designers, art directors and architects. It combines highly artistic, high-resolution images of beautiful things combined with the practical applications allowed by the material itself. We love partnering with Don, and we think BIGS will prove highly successful with both the residential and commercial marketplace.”

“When single image installations were in vogue some decades ago, the subject matter was usually a sunset or treescape, and the resolution was incredibly low,” notes Flood. “Inspired by an interiors shot I came across from the late ‘60s, I began to experiment with various images at extremely high resolution. Given the printing technology and materials available to us today, BIGS became a reality very quickly. I am excited to show how beautifully a high-resolution, single-image wallcovering transforms a space.”

art wallcovering of butterfly wing
This extreme close-up of a butterfly wing can be produced as an art wallcovering through FLIEPAPER (www.fliepaper.com)

Imagine What You Could Design With 3D or Interactive Wallpaper

DESIGNERS. Digital printing has empowered you to bring new levels of customization to retail, office, and residential spaces. Two recently publicized projects might enable you to do even more.

DEEP: 3D Wallpaper from twenty2

In a partnership with students at Pratt Institute, the wallpaper-design firm twenty2 developed DEEP, a curated collection of 3D wallpapers. The wallpaper-design project was part of a graduate design seminar on interactive pattern and ornament created by Yale Architect and Pratt Institute professor Sarah Strauss.

As mentors to the program, Krya Hartnett and Robertson Hartnett of twenty2 encouraged students to push the design limits of pattern repeat and dimension. Some of the most innovative designs from the students have been brought to life and are printed in the twenty2’s Litchfield, Connecticut studio.

Big, bold blossoms fill your space when you don 3D glasses.  by twenty2 brings big bold blooms into your space when you don the 3D glasses. ©2004 twenty2
Big, bold blossoms fill your space when you don 3D glasses. This design was created by LuzElena Wood and is available from twenty2. ©2004 twenty2

 

Smart Wallpaper Include Printed Electronics

According to a story posted on International Business Times, researchers at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore have developed printed electronics that can transform walls into digital devices that include miniature speakers, microphones, switches, and sensors.

With the electronics printed on your wallpaper,  you can talk out loud to command your devices. The walls will then transmit your request or ask for further instructions.

Smart wallpaper could be helpful for elderly people who are living alone. People who fall and hurt themselves can ask the walls to contact the right people for help.

NTU Professor Joseph Chang told IBTimes UK that “Essentially we can print full, complex electronic circuits on any substrate, including paper, aluminum, and plastic film.”

Imagine what you could design with electronics on those types of materials. For example, residential windows could be overlaid with transparent film that includes circuits. Milk cartons could let you know when the milk is expired. Smart patches could monitor your heart rate or other vital signs.

What would you do with 3D wallpaper, smart wallpaper, or flexible materials printed with electronics?

LINKS

Smart Wallpaper Uses Printed Electronics to Transform Your Walls into Big iPhone

twenty2.net

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Can Custom-Designed Wallcoverings Hit it Big? Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!

BeatlesWallpaper5-FramedSee this aged print? It’s a scrap of Beatles wallpaper that I have framed in my home office. It brings back fond memories of my Beatle-maniac tween years when my Mom let me cover one whole wall of my bedroom with Beatles wallpaper. I don’t need to keep more than this scrap, because this cheesy graphic was repeated all over the wall.

Imagine how much cooler my Beatles wall could have looked if today’s digital printing technology and inkjet-printable wallcovering materials had been available in the ’60s.

Previous posts on this blog have discussed how designers and photographers are capitalizing on the potential to create custom wallcoverings and photo murals. Now, digital-printing leaders such as HP are making it easier for more print-service providers to produce custom wallcoverings.

HP’s goal is to enable everyone from small, local print-service providers to large wallcovering manufacturers to take advantage of the growing interest in customized décor. Growth-focused printing companies that once specialized in printing documents or photographs may soon be able to print custom wall décor for commercial, retail, and residential spaces.

At the Heimtextil 2014 show in Frankfurt, Germany, HP announced an expanded suite of digital printing solutions for wall decorations. The HP digital printing solution consists of a modular range of design software, media, HP Latex Printing Technology, finishing options, and industry certifications.

For HP’s booth, industrial and interior designer Markus Benesch set up a wall décor showroom.

“My goal is to encourage spectators to think outside the box and see the unusual ways in which digital printing can dramatically alter a space,” said Benesch. “HP digital printing technologies create a world in which designers no longer need to print large batches of wall décor at once. Instead, they can be fast as light—moving immediately from idea to design to production to delivery.”

Heimtextil HP stand 2-600p
Digitally printed wallpapers designed by Markus Benesch were displayed in the HP booth at the Heimtextil 2014 show in Frankfurt, Germany. Photo courtesy of HP.

“The wall decoration market is on the verge of major change enabled by the speed, quality, and versatility of HP Latex digital printing technology,” said Joan Perez Pericot, worldwide marketing director, Large Format Sign and Display Division.

At the show, HP demonstrated HP WallArt, a cloud-based web service that helps simplify the design, visualization and production of customized wallcoverings. Introduced at Heimtextil 2013, the HP WallArt service is already in use by more than 1100 customers in 66 countries.

Some of the new features include:

  • a new alliance with the global stock photography company Fotolia
  • integration with customers’ online storefronts for a customized and branded web-to-print solution that streamlines quotations, billing, and managed information systems
  • a free HP WallArt applications for iPad to provide real-time, interactive design and accurate previews of the finished wall layout

Users of the HP WallArt solution can showcase their wallcovering installations with the global design community on the HP for Designers Facebook page.

If you have designs and art that would look great on more walls, now is a good time to start thinking outside the frame.

LINKS

HP Solutions for Wallcoverings

HP WallArt

HP for Designers Facebook page

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Custom Wallpaper Opens New Avenues for Graphic Designers

Guest Post by Chris Garrett

Most people don’t get excited when they hear about wallpaper, and for good reason. For decades wallpaper has been associated with drab rooms, awful color, peeling walls, and designs that cause retina bleeding. However, the awful wallpapers of yesteryear don’t need to be featured in modern homes, businesses, or studios anymore. Digitally printed custom wallpaper can feature any design, photo, or theme that you’d like to see featured on a wall or other surface.

A Dynamic Change in the Home

While solid colors or repeating designs are still the norm when it comes to interior walls in the home, seeing murals or unique designs are becoming more common. I remember a middle-school friend  who was a huge Washington State fan. His parents paid a painter to come in and paint a beautiful mural of a cougar on the wall above his bed. While this was a jealously-inducing addition to his 13 year old friends, there were limitations to the paint.

Time and Resources: Even just painting a room a solid color is a chore and a half. You have to tape, put plastic down, edge corners, strain to reach the high places, and dedicate a solid chunk of time to painting even the smallest room in the house. For a custom design or mural, you have to hire an artist who also has to do the above-mentioned tasks. Custom wallpaper can be applied much faster than a painted mural and fewer items are needed to install it.

Things Change: My friend has since moved out and his room is now holds barely used exercise equipment. Painting over the mural is easier said than done because you have to match the wall color which has since faded – so now the entire room or wall has to be painted.  Repositionable wallpaper (remember the Fathead commercials?) is an easy solution to this. Simply peel off the design and move it somewhere else, store it, or replace it.

Artistic Limitations: Having a one-of-a-kind mural is cool, but it can be difficult to find someone who has the required skill and is willing to do the job within your budget. Printers don’t care how detailed or elaborate the piece is; the print quality will be top-notch. Homeowners can hire a graphic designer to create unique visuals for their walls, or submit photographs or artwork to the printing company, Most printing firms offer a choice of wallcovering materials for printing your design.

Custom Wallpaper in Businesses

It’s become much more common to see custom wallpaper in commercial establishments where businesses can use the custom printing to highlight products, services, or brand identity. Some of the most common establishments are restaurants, colleges, sports venues, and offices.

This is where a graphic designer can really get involved. As businesses look to brand themselves, or look to incorporate their brand into their wallpaper, top-notch graphic artists can step up and produce eye popping work. Check out these examples.

Rangers Lobby: The Texas Rangers wanted their lobby to capture the feeling and excitement of opening day so they made it appear like the back wall was a view from a stadium entrance. Notice how even the elevator doors have printing on them to keep the picture largely uninterrupted.

Photo courtesy of MegaPrint

Eye-Catching Branding: Forever Yogurt kept their hot pink theme going without being overpowering along their back wall. They also proudly display their logo and company name which is artistically highlighted by the doodle like cityscape, which is a nice transition from the corrugated metal below. This is a great example of bold graphic design being used in tandem with custom wallpaper.

Photo courtesy of Megaprint
Photo courtesy of Megaprint

If You Want More…

I realize for the detail oriented I may have raised more questions than I’ve answered. You can find more information about the nitty-gritty details such as paper stock, photo resolution, and materials from this custom wallpaper FAQs page. Custom wallpaper can be applied to a host of different areas, not just walls, and you can get creative with its application and design more so than paint or stock wall paper.

Chris Garrett is a freelance writer for the large format printing and custom wallpaper expert megaprint.com, and blogs on the topics of design and printing.

LINKS

MegaPrint Custom Wallpaper

FAQs about Custom Wallpaper

Spoonflower Lets You Custom Design Wallpaper

Digitally printed, custom wallpaper is a rapidly growing trend in the decorating world, but until now it has been expensive and hard to find. With a new line of eco-friendly wallpaper and wall decals, the Spoonflower.com website has put personalized home decor within the reach of more designers, including crafters and do-it-yourself decorators.

With an eye toward environmentally conscious consumers and moms looking to decorate nurseries and kids’ rooms, Spoonflower wallpaper is printed on PVC-free paper using durable, eco-friendly inks. Unlike traditional wallpapers that can be devilishly difficult to take down, Spoonflower wallpaper is removable, making it suitable for renters and college students.

Individuals who don’t feel comfortable designing their own wallpaper can choose from thousands of designs by independent artists who have made their work available first on digitally printed fabric, and now as wallpaper.

The wallpaper sells for $5 per linear foot (24  by 12 inches), or $60 per roll (24 by 12 inches).

Spoonflower also offers three sizes of peel-and-stick wall decals: 5 by 5 inches, 15 by 15 inches, and 30 by 30 inches.  These easy to reposition decals are printed using eco-friendly inks on a tough polyester material that’s perfect for any room in the house, as well as for decorating furniture, trays, refrigerators, laptops, and many other everyday items. The decals can be easily removed.

“Wallpaper is definitely on an upswing in the decorating world, especially in the US, where it used to be perceived as fussy and old-fashioned. We’re incredibly excited to introduce custom wallpaper and decals at prices that make them accessible to everyday people, using materials that will appeal to folks who rent as well as homeowners,” said Spoonflower co-founder Stephen Fraser. He  says he hopes to persuade his wife to let him cover one of the bathrooms in their house with narwhals in the near future.

Lori Craffey of Little Rhody Design Company, a crafter from Rhode Island who sells on Etsy, was impressed by Spoonflower’s new products: “I just received my first wallpaper samples today! I love the quality and the packaging.” Craffey is one of thousands of indie artists on Spoonflower planning to make their designs available for sale to consumers as wallpaper.

Spoonflower has been in business since 2008, making it possible for individuals to create, print, and sell their own fabric designs. The site was founded by two Internet geeks who knew nothing about textiles, but had crafty wives.

Spoonflower’s community includes more than 600,000 individuals who use their own fabric to make curtains, quilts, clothes, bags, furniture, dolls, pillows, framed artwork, costumes, banners and more. Spoonflower’s marketplace offers the largest collection of independent fabric designers in the world.

LINKS

Spoonflower: Create Your Own Wallpaper

Spoonflower: Custom-Designed Fabrics