Digital printing technologies are revolutionizing the interior décor business according to Mark Sollman, Application Manager at Mimaki. Not only can these items be produced more rapidly and with less waste than with traditional manufacturing processes, digital printing offers the ability to customize – or even personalize – interior décor. This is a growing demand from retiring Baby Boomers as well as Millennials and Gen-Zers, who want to customize their home environments. Businesses also benefit from the ability to customize their interior décor, and the affordability of changing the décor as needed.
Here a five ways to leverage digital printing for a more exciting décor by Mimaki:
1. Wallpaper
Wallpaper is the most obvious use for digital printing for interior decoration. For a long time, wallpaper had a very corny and old-fashioned image, but new modern designs and on-demand digital printing have changed this. As a result, this decor staple from way back when has suddenly become cool again in recent years. Nowadays, suppliers can provide wallpaper in just about any design, based either on their own designs or according to a customer’s specifications. Do you want wallpaper with a specific photo, colour scheme or maybe of a certain structure or fabric? Thanks to inkjet printing technology, all of this is completely possible, fast and affordable.
2. Upholstery
Digital printing and upholstery are a golden combination. The design of a fabric no longer needs to be generic and suitable for mass production. Various types of fabrics can be printed on-demand (even silk!) with any possible design and in any required quantity. As such, the uses are endless and affordable. Think about unique curtains, upholstery for chairs and couches, bedding and pillows. The upholstery can be designed to perfectly blend in with the colour scheme or print required by the interior decorator. Sublimation print technology also delivers brilliant colours, enabling even bright tropical colours to be used effectively.
3. Glass
When we mention decorative glass, most people think about stained glass windows. Thanks to UV curable digital printing technology, printing can be done on a growing number of materials, including glass! An additional benefit of this technique is that the printed designs are scratch- and waterproof and will not fade with time. There are many more uses of glass printing besides stained glass windows. Glass panels could, for example, also be used to give an artsy or modern twist to the architecture or interior decoration. It is possible to print more than two thousand transparent or covering colours on standard glass or structured glass. This can be done to completely transform a bathroom, meeting room, office, hotel lobby, or a wall.
4. Tiles
In addition to glass, it is also possible to print directly on ceramic tiles. This offers amazing new opportunities to print unique designs on floor and wall tiles for kitchens, bathrooms, swimming pools or to create a complete mural. Printing on demand enables a design to be distributed seamlessly across multiple tiles, or even an entire wall. This introduces a new level of interior decoration potential for these areas. Finally, there is also another recognisable use: do you need more tiles for a certain project where the original tiles you purchased are no longer available? A small batch can be reproduced on request using digital printing technology.
5. Wood
We started with the most obvious use of digital printing and end with probably the most surprising: wood. For those who like a more rustic, country atmosphere in the home or business environment, digital UV printing technology can be used to print directly on wood. This can be done on small objects or panels, but there are also large format printers that can be used to print directly on a door! This gives restaurants, cafés or hotels new options to include unique printed wooden elements in their interior design. Without digital printing technology, this would indeed be almost impossible and unaffordable, due to the manual labour required. Now this unique design element is within easy reach for projects of any size.
Digital printing not only opens up many opportunities for amazing interior décor, but it can also be used for Fast Fashion. Imagine the ability to not only customize your home or office but your wardrobe as well. The future is here, and it is digital printing.
