Company designs smart bricks to turn your regular walls into interactive ones

Moving a step ahead of smart homes, a design company has made a new software-controlled smart bricks of the future, designed to inspire a new creative era in art and architecture. 

Modifying old-school bricks, design studio ‘Breakfast’ has showed a demo of a new technology called ‘Brixels’ – a compound for bricks and pixels – that are brick-like pieces of material that are controlled through software.

“We saw an opportunity to blur the lines between what is deemed ‘art,’ ‘infrastructure,’ and a ‘digital display,’ We sought to develop a new medium that would allow us to create a variety of captivating installations that are, at first, perceived as art, and second, deliver relevant information and unique experiences,” said Andrew Zolty, Breakfast's Co-Founder and Head of Design.

As described by Curbed, Brixels are smart, infinitely rotating, giant blocks that come in various customizable shapes, size, color and material, from wood rectangles to gilded diamonds. Controlled via an app, Brixels have built-in actuators that allow them to rotate to any precise position and spin endlessly in any direction, providing designers with a new tool to manufacture adaptable public and living spaces.

Moreover, Futurism wrote, Breakfast’s double-sided Brixel Mirror can be used to transform a solid color into a mirror as well. The Brixel Mirror is an 18ft wide by 6ft tall installation made up of 540 Brixels, black on one side and mirrored on the other. Controlled via smartphone, with various content and interactive experiences, a person can enjoy Brixel Mirror in various ways, including a ‘Silhouette’ experience where the mirror will match silhouette of the person and move with it.

Video Courtesy: Breakfast

More interestingly, Brixels can be designed and assembled into almost any configuration, letting them to be used for interactive art sculptures, railings, facades, dynamic walls. They can also be used to display digital content or respond to movements of passers-by.

“In the hands of industry innovators, this new technology can usher in an aesthetic defined by kinetic walls and installations that are as mesmerizing as they are functional,” according to the company. As per the designers, these bricks are meant for artists and architects who wish to build interactive installations and structures.