RGB LEDs Make Recycled Art Shine at SF’s Green Fest

Two weekends ago I took a trip up to San Francisco for Green Festival, the country’s premier event for businesses, communities and the environment. Green Festivals are held all over the country (the Los Angeles event was last weekend), but attending the one in San Francisco is kind of like seeing live jazz music in New Orleans: you feel like you’re where it all began. The folks at The Sustainable Living Roadshow (SLR) invited my non profit organization, RuckusRoots, up to bring an interactive art installation to the official Green Fest after party, which was held in SLR’s new venue in the Mission district. We were very excited to expose more people to the creative fun of adding leaves to our TRASHformation tree. All of the leaves on the tree are made out of recycled aluminum cans. Once again, we had participants write or draw on the back of the leaves, and drill them on to the tree. It’s great to see the tree getting filled up with personalized leaves collected from sustainably minded people from all over the country and world! Everyone had a blast doing it, and our LED wall washers, donated by Elemental LED, once again helped to make the entire installation pop. We got so many compliments on how pretty the aluminum leaves look in the RGB LED illumination…and I would have to agree: it looked pretty snazzy. What do you think?

LED Accent Lights Transform Traditional Wine Cellar

It’s hard to tell if this is a futuristic Cathedral or an underground portal to some kind of TRON reality, but in fact, it’s an RGB LED filled wine cellar designed by Nashville, Tennessee-based interior designer Jamie Beckwith. The translucent acrylic arches are lined with LED cove lighting that serves 2 purposes: to illuminate the wine bottles in temperature-safe lighting, and to look extra cool. An especially nifty feature is that the living room of the Franklin, Tennessee home features a glass floor, making the wine cellar visible from above! Typically, wine cellars are stuffy, old fashioned affairs, but this design turns that concept on its head, making going downstairs to get the latest reserve a whole new experience, though sneaking another bottle is out, thanks to the transparent ceiling. Well done, Beckwith!

Alicia Keys Helps Debut Empire State Building’s New LED Lights

Last Tuesday the New York City skyline was lit up like never before, thanks to a new RGB LED lighting system installed on the top of the Empire State Building. Certain componenets of the new system were tested on presidential election night this year, with blue and red LED meters displaying voting results. Read about it here.  Now the installation of the entire system is complete and the building debuted its new rig with a dazzling light display, which showed off the system’s capabilities, including a 16 million-color palette and boundless effects, including ripples, cross-fades, sparkles, chasers, sweeps, strobes and bursts. Officials synched the lighting show to two Alicia Keys songs that ooze New York pride: “Girl on Fire” and “Empire State of Mind.” NYC residents could tune into one of four radio stations to listen to the songs while watching the synched LED lighting show in real time. “In addition to greater control and management of the lighting, the new computerized system will deliver superior light and vibrancy levels,” according to the Huffington Post. The LED lighting system replaced incandescent flood lights, and promises to increase visibility and the range of custom, dynamic shows the iconic building can display.

Holiday LED Light Sightings on the Road

Well, Christmas has come and gone, but that doesn’t mean our enjoyment of the holiday lights has to wane just yet. This week I’m in Colorado visiting family and I was amazed to see many extravagant and high tech light displays. This one we found on the way home from my uncle’s house; it was an amazing display of outdoor LED lights that wrapped around a huge property, including a horse pasture. Each tree was wrapped with a different color of RGB LED lights, and thanks to the freshly fallen snow, the effect was magical! I especially loved the long corridor of LED lights leading to the houses. I know the holidays can be a stressful time, but I have to say, I’ll miss seeing all of these beautiful displays of personal creativity, festivity and technology! Until next year, dear readers! Happy Holidays!

LED Lights Bring Brazilian Olympic Costumes to Life

If you’re like me, you wish the Olympics came around more often than every two years. If you’re even more like me, you find yourself dreaming of warm weather locales when the temperature dips below 75. That being said, you might understand why I’m taking a trip back in time for this post to remember the gorgeous LED costumes created by German designer Moritz Waldemeyer for this year’s Olympic closing ceremonies in London.

LED undercabinet lighting

The 2016 Summer Olympics will be held in Rio, Brazil, and so the 2012 closing ceremonies culminated with a reminder of what’s to come: the bright, colorful aesthetic of South America’s biggest country, as well as its passion for music, dancing and, well, passion. Brazilian culture presents a welcome contrast to that of England, not that there’s anything wrong with say, the Industrial Revolution, mist-shrouded castles or James Bond.

LED undercabinet lighting

But Waldemeyer’s costumes brilliantly emphasized (not to mention illuminated, thanks to LED strip lights) some powerful cornerstones of Brazilian society: Carnival, the festival that kicks off Lent forty days before Easter, Afro-Brazilian culture and indigenous culture. Waldemeyer’s collection included 140 costumes decked out in flexible LED strip lights, which dancers and musicians wore during four different performances.

LED undercabinet lighting

Samba dancers wielded Ferris wheels illuminated with fixtures that looked almost like LED undercabinet lighting; the drummers’ instruments glowed thanks to LEDs configured in circular patterns; indigenous dancers wore green LED accent lights made to look like traditional tribal jewelry; and Maracatu performers dawned LED bulbs and hair ribbons.

LED undercabinet lighting

Waldemeyer didn’t stop there. He also wirelessly connected the costume LEDs to the stadium’s radio network, which allowed the lights to display and animate in synch with the music.

The designs succeeded in blending old traditions with contemporary technology, and in getting viewers excited for the next summer Olympics. Personally, I may not be able to wait until 2016…Carnival 2013, anyone?

Champagne Corks Create Stunning LED Chandelier

Here’s a great example of striking decor created from recycled materials that’s perfect for the new year! The “Celebration Chandelier” is made from champagne corks by London-based British designer Alkesh Parmar. I’m guessing Parmar had a lot of materials to work with after the new year’s eve parties were over! Each cork is hollowed out and outfitted with LED puck lights, which cast a warm glow on anything below. Parmar can make custom versions of this chandelier to fit any space, be it restaurant, home or office. His intentions were to use up some of the large amounts of trash being thrown away by the bars in his neighborhood, and in the process he created beautiful and stylish LED light fixtures. To find out more about Parmar and his lighting design, visit his website.

Illuminating LED Push Pins Eradicate Forgetfulness

I don’t care how many calendar and organizing apps you have on your smartphone—nothing can beat the simple directness of a sticky note placed prominently on the wall, or a handwritten list for that matter. But if you’re like most of us, one sticky note after another creates a pile of homogenous paper that’s hard to sift through—and a pile of tasks that’s hard to remember to accomplish…until now. Designer Kim Sung Min developed a solution to this problem by combining technology with the preferred, analogue approach of many, which allows us to have our sticky notes and eat them, too. Min’s illuminating LED pushpins each come with a tiny DMX LED light and a dial, which you can set to turn on at the exact time and date desired. Called “It’s Time to Read Me,” this concept includes a custom board that delivers electricity to the LED thumbtacks when they’re pushed in. Besides productivity, the board could provide some fun, ambient LED home lighting, depending on how busy you are. “It’s Time to Read Me” won a “Best of the Best” Red Dot design award for 2012, and while it’s not yet available for purchase, you can find out more about this innovative product and its designer on the Red Dot website. Who’s ready to take on the day?