New gadget lets you ‘hear’ your carpet

The annual Las Vegas CES exhibition took place last week, and among the gadgets at the show was the Sphero Specdrum, which could bring a whole new sensory experience to carpet.

Costing around £50, the device as a ring that, when worn and tapped against a colour, communicates the colour to a phone app, which in turn converts the colour to sound. It can also sense the tapping rhythm of the user.

Some people have a condition known as synaesthesia, which is the ability to perceive colours as sounds. The Specdrum system allows anyone to experience this.

By tapping the ring on different areas of a patterned carpet, it is possible to experience the sound of the carpet. The app also works the other way round, in that a user can assign sounds to different colours of the carpet.

The app can work with more than one ring, so in theory users could wear Spectrum rings on many fingers to create a symphony from the carpet.

Although the Specdrum is a toy, it could be used in education with children creating music from their colourful classroom environment. It comes with a coloured Play Pad that acts as a keyboard to compose tunes.

The Specdrum ring and phone applicators become available in the USA today (January 15) and may be available in Britain shortly afterwards.

Luckily, no gadget is needed to enjoy a new colourful pattern carpet in your Chester home. Flooring services in Chester have a wide range of new season designs that are guaranteed not to make a noise.