Do you ever walk through campus or downtown and see residence buildings with glowing, color-changing windows? Chances are that you have, and chances are what you’re seeing in their rooms are the ever-popular rainbow LED strip lights that are taking the college décor world by storm. They come in a long, plastic band that houses tiny lights color-controlled by a little remote. Users can set it to one solid color or they can make the room shift between shades in different rainbow modes, some fast and some slow. The strip even has a peel-off adhesive backing to make it easy to stick right onto the wall.
One of the reasons many students are called to these lights is because they add a luxury feel to university housing or a bland apartment. Philip Byers, a freshman majoring in economics, has his Simmons dorm decked out in colored band lights, and says, “It makes my dorm look much more put together and expensive, even though the lights themselves didn’t cost much.”
Megan Cummins, a telecommunications major, states a different reason to keep lights in Eastview Terrace residence. “The colors add such a nice vibe to my space,” she expresses. “I can choose any color to fit my mood or maybe to fit a song I’m playing. They’re so nice and calming after a long day.”
Whatever reason you have to crave some color in your casa, don’t let decorating intimidate you. Remember, these lights aren’t like normal string lights you wind around a Christmas tree. They come in a flat, smooth band about a half-inch in width that is coated with sticky material on the back. You don’t need to worry about stringing the lights around pegs or tacks in the wall, you just directly stick the band onto the surface.
The easiest and most common way to decorate with these is by placing them around the perimeter of your space, at the crevice where the walls meet the ceiling. This is an easy way to ensure that your entire room will be coated in color.
However, if you would like to go a little out of the box with your rainbow lights, try sticking them onto the vertical edges of your walls. Line up a strip from the floor to the ceiling at a corner, and it will give your room a more unique look than if you just have them horizontally around the perimeter. Another cool way to utilize them is to place them around a window or a door to give them a highlighted, hazy effect.
Additionally, you could cut the lights into smaller strips and use them to trick out your desk or maybe a set of shelves. Stick them around a piece of furniture in multiple spots and angles, and it will surely make that object, and your space, look 10 times cooler.
