Be honest: When was the last time the lighting in your house warranted someone positively commenting on it? (And, no, the praise you received for switching that one, hard-to-reach lightbulb in the bathroom doesn’t count!)
Get ready for that to change with an awesome new Kickstarter campaign, promising modular touch screen wall lights which turn regular boring walls into a so-called “canvas for illumination, using your hand as the brush.”
Called Helios Touch, the lights take the form of plastic hexagons, called “Helios,” that can be connected together using built-in magnets to form a variety of patterns. Each hexagonal light is touch-activated, so that the press of a hand will turn it off or on again.
“What we’ve developed is a modular lighting system that gives the user a more tactile lighting experience, in which they can have as much or as little light as they want,” co-founder James Glover told Digital Trends. “You get to turn lights on and off using a swipe of the wall. It’s a fun kind of feedback for illuminating a room, almost like an art installation.”
The lighting system was first started as a final year university project by design graduate James Vanderpant, who subsequently decided that it could be worth developing into something more professional. Vanderpant teamed with mechanical engineer James Glover, who helped develop the project from (pun kind of intended) bright idea to full-fledged consumer product.
“This would be a great fit for anyone wanting a stylistic feature for their home,” Glover continued. “At the same time, we think there’s definitely a professional market. People could have their company logo lit up on the wall. We’ve also had someone buy 200 Helios, with the idea of using them for an office atrium. Anytime you want something that will draw people in, I think this would be a great fit.”
Conservatively, the pair is saying it’s possible to have 105 Helios in a single block — although as the aforementioned large order suggests, you can have more than if you really want to. “If you want bigger installations, you’ll need to electrically isolate the block areas, just because there’s a limit to how much you should put through one power socket,” Glover said.
The Helios Touch lights are currently available for pre-order on Kickstarter, where a 5 Helios pack will set you back 49 pounds ($60), although the more you buy, the cheaper the per-Helio unit cost becomes. Shipping is set to take place in April 2017.
