I tried Twinkly LED panels, they transform my rental home and bring pixel art to life - MyLondon

Oct 14, 2024

The Twinkly LED is an easy way to decorate your home and it can turn into a Halloween and Christmas decoration at the click of a button, and shoppers can get it from Amazon

When it comes to renting, I have become wary of what I am allowed to do to put my own stamp on the home without violating any clauses in the rental agreement. However, it's dull and lacks character, with four blank walls in crisp white paint.

Even if the landlord kindly put up picture frames, they would hardly be to my liking. My solution is the customisable Twinkly LED Squares, with which I can create my own art and make it animated.

I got the Twinkly LED Squares Starter Kit and a three-piece Extension Kit, which are available on Amazon, to form a nine-patch square as my canvas - from a Super Mario question box, a multi-coloured Christmas tree to a moving text box and audio-reactive waves.

READ MORE: Amazon knocks £30 off 'sharp and luxurious' Ninja self-sharpening knife set

READ MORE: B&M shoppers wowed by how 'stylish' £14 thermal fleece is that comes in six colours

So, how does it work? The Starter Kit, now reduced to £214.99, comes with one master panel and five extension panels, as well as a mounting kit should you prefer to hang it up. I've connected the extra three pieces from the Extension Kit, and with my brother's help, we converted them into a giant Toblerone.

The set up was easy, simply plug the master panel into the socket and connect the rest of the panels with cables, then download the Twinkly app to pair and it's good to go. It requires mapping, which involves taking a picture of the set up, so users can apply advanced effects on the pixels.

It's worth pointing out that when the app is upgraded, the saved mapping settings are also wiped out, meaning you have to start from scratch again. In the Twinkly app, I was able to pick animated pixel presets such as a Christmas tree with colour effects, a red heart with a pair of eyes, Piet Mondrian's colour block, etc.

But the cool thing is, I can also import pictures from my phone gallery, or create my own art, or download from third-party platforms like Divoom. The LED lights are so bright that I could see the colour change of the Christmas tree in broad daylight, the colours are well-balanced and the animations run smoothly with no glitch. The Twinkly Squares turned my living room into a mini pop-art exhibition, bringing pixel art to life.

You can also select certain audio-reactive themes. It means when you speak or play music, the LED lights respond to the audio and flash according to the sound. Friends who visited my home thought it required high-calibre programming when it's actually just a few clicks on the Twinkly app.

The LED panels brought the room alive with a kick of nostalgia, but while testing different templates, I realised that some presets only work if I have more panels, and it could cost a fortune. Otherwise, it only displays part of the pixel art. The text box function only works in English and numbers but not in other languages like Japanese or Chinese.

Twinkly LED is an easy way to decorate your home, and it can be taken down and stored in a box. It's much cooler than a framed poster or a reprint of a drawing, it can be a Halloween and Christmas decoration at the click of a button.

Besides Twinkly, Divoom's Bluetooth Speaker with Pixel Art is a portable decor with an LED screen attached to a retro toy computer. Looking for something more exquisite? Vieunite's Textura is a digital canvas that gives users an exclusive use of world-class artwork and brings it to life at home.