December 19, 2012

Nature Trail: Magic LED wall help calm nervous kids in hospitals

by Gareth Mankoo

There’s no heart wrenching sight like that of a child been taken into surgery. In the UK, there seems to be a certain special effort put into the fact that the children headed to the OT need to be calmed down, in the face of anxious relatives and hyperactive doctors. A London based design studio has come up with the concept of an interactive LED wall, themed around a magic forest. Called Nature Trail, this wall occupies 165 feet of corridor at the Mittal Children’s Medical Centre at London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital. Over 72,000 LEDs reside in the 70 LED panels that are triggered by motion sensors. These form shapes of animals and bring about a calming, enchanted feeling to distressed young patients.


“The idea came from remembering walks in my childhood,” said Jason Bruges from the Jason Bruges Studio, which created the installation. “I loved spotting and following things, those stolen glances and glimpses… I was trying to re-create this with the idea of digital lookout points along the corridor.” 2017 will see this spread to more walls.
CNet