Curtains. A necessary home furnishing item. Adds a beauty element, yes. But perhaps not the most exciting thing you would buy. Immense utility, yes. Tech quotient, not so much. But that is set to change. Swedish furniture retail company Ikea is developing curtains for your homes, that can also purify the indoor air. These will be called GUNRID air purifying curtains. The company is developing a mineral-based surface treatment, which will allow the new Ikea curtain to break down air pollutants in the indoor air, when it gets in contact with sunlight, outdoor light or even indoor lighting.
Just what exactly this mineral is, Ikea doesn’t specify yet. That is understandable, since they wouldn’t want shabby masqueraders to end up in the market anytime soon. “For me, it’s important to work on products that solve actual problems and are relevant to people. Textiles are used across homes and by enabling a curtain to purify the air, we are creating an affordable and space-saving air purifying solution that also makes the home more beautiful,” says Mauricio Affonso, Product Developer at IKEA Range & Supply. Ikea says they have worked with universities in Europe and Asia to develop this technology.
Ikea is big on sustainability. Last year, the company had started the ‘Better Air Now!’ initiative to turn rice straw, a rice harvesting residue that is traditionally burnt and releases significant amount of smoke and pollution into the environment, into a new renewable material source for the products and furniture that Ikea makes.
It is not known how much the Ikea GUNRID curtains would cost or when exactly they would go on sale, but Ikea confirms that these will be in stores next year.
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