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Ever been shopping for furniture and wondered how that sofa would look in your living room? Usually you can't see that unless you actually drag that sofa into your home. Or, you could take a picture, blow it up to a life-size poster, and throw it on the floor... but that wouldn't really work. Well, IKEA's new catalog app solves that problem -- it lets you use your smartphone to virtually see a piece of furniture in your home. You guys, this is going to save marriages.
So here's how it works. When you see an item in the catalog with the orange plus icon you can scan that item. Then you can actually project an image of that item into a room. You can do this using the online catalog, but I hear it works better with the physical catalog. You'll also need to scale the item by focusing your camera on the catalog in the place where you want to see the furniture. You can see how it all works in the (predicably) cute and whimsical video below.
I love this idea. If you tend to obsess over finding the perfect item, like I do, this should remove a huge chunk of doubt over making a decision. You can measure the space to make sure something fits, of course. But will it look right? I like to have a vision of what something is going to look like, how it will harmonize with everthing else in my room, before I go through the trouble of buying it and shipping or carrying it home.
And that's just me -- if you're married or cohabitating you need to have meeting of the minds. Deciding how you feel about that bookcase before someone spends five hours putting it together could save your relationship. Then again, is this app actually going to cause more squabbles? If you're seeing the furniture virtually you can still argue over it. By the time something is put together in your house, a lot of people will just put up with it rather than argue.
Still, I think it's a brilliant idea. It's just a matter of time before other furniture and housewares stores copy the idea, don't you think? If they're smart they'll get on that now.
See this video on The Stir by CafeMom.
Would this app be helpful for you?
Image via IKEA/YouTube
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