NEWS REPORT
Design is going digital – yes, even more so than ever before. So what does virtual reality mean for how you’ll be decorating this year?
The latest virtual-reality tech influencing the way we decorate our homes
remember how revolutionary online shopping felt? Perhaps the first time your groceries arrived in a van it seemed like they brought the future with them. Well, that was just phase one, fuelled by convenience, and in current times, necessity has taken charge. For reports of a surge in web shopping are accompanied by an intriguing trend: burgeoning retailer investment in augmented-reality (AR) technology, from decorating apps that bridge the ‘imagination gap’ – solving the problem of evaluating paint choices by projecting them onto walls via a smartphone – to shoppable ‘rooms’ that reveal how furniture will look in real life. Formerly, these might have felt like a gimmick; today, as we all shop from our sofas, they look essential.
These techie updates are going to change the way you design. Take Made, with its virtual, interactive apartment created to launch its AW20 collection. Consisting of four inspiring rooms that ‘visitors’ could shop as they toured the space, it feels more engaging than just scrolling through a site. AR is just as useful for the more practical aspects of decorating. Dulux’s Visualizer app helps you to see how its paints will look with your own decor (the eco benefits seen in how it cuts the number of sample pots you’ll need to try), while Graham & Brown’s version demonstrates how a wallpaper’s scale and repeat will look once hung. ‘It’s a big step forward from the old swatch method, and if you find something you like you can buy it then and there,’ says head of brand marketing Alan Kemp. People make bolder choices after using the app, he adds, which saw a 62% increase in downloads this year.
AR tech is changing interior design as well as shopping behaviour. Life Kitchens has a 4D virtual-reality theatre in its Waterloo showroom, which enables customers to ‘jump into their future kitchen’ before it’s built. A costly investment suddenly seems much less of a risk. Design firm Hollandgreen explains that 3D modelling of clients’ spaces allows for visualisation of a scheme much earlier in the design process; mistakes are eliminated before installation, and money and resources are saved. ‘The technology allows clients to collaborate more with designers,’ adds co-founder Stephen Green. ‘Changing a colour scheme is just a click away.’
Ollie Kilvert, founder of The 360 View, produces virtual property tours for major developers and believes the practice will go mainstream in 2021. His company started in 2016 when he was selling his own home. After posting a tour online, his pool of buyers expanded dramatically. ‘We eventually sold to a couple from Singapore, who loved all the details they could see – right down to the woodgrain on banisters,’ he says. Not just a substitute for the physical, augmented reality is often several steps ahead.