Life n Colors tripled their business and expanded their décor offerings by using HP Latex technology to produce unmatched print quality for their clients, the world over.

Enrich home aesthetics through high-quality wallpapers brought to life via custom-made, vibrant, intricately designed patterns and motifs across India and the world.

Leveraging HP Latex printing technology paired with their design expertise, Life n Colors made use of digital applications to take their business across India and beyond

• Helped decorate homes and commercial establishments with their wallpapers across 70+ cities in India and over 7 countries including France, UAE, and the USA within 3 years!
• Broadened their offering to customers by 2x and increased business by 3x

How Life n Colors’ design expertise created market supremacy when paired with the right printing technology

Cofounded by Apourva Sharma and Ashutosh Pandey, Life n Colors, based in Gurugram is one of India’s leading innovators in premium home décor products, specifically wallpapers. Both are seasoned corporate professionals who segued and dived full-time into the home décor industry. Here’s how the story began.

Inspired by her travels across the globe, Apourva identified the need gap for Indian aesthetics in the wallpaper market, which, at the time, was dominated by imported, undifferentiated, and dull designs. Thus, Life n Colors was born, with a core value of infusing life to the walls with their vibrant wallpapers with custom-made, richly colored, intricately designed Indian patterns and motifs, that begin on paper, and then made their creative journey from print to walls.

Very soon, Life n Colors experienced that their vision fell short, as they were unable to deliver the premium quality they had promised to their customers. This was owing to their reliance on multiple print vendors, their printer’s inability to experiment with diverse print media, and the threat of exposing their hand-made design IP to be freely available for copying.

Enabling production in-house was the need of the hour. Thus began a rigorous evaluation of printers that could do justice to their design expertise. Some of the critical decision parameters were:

• The printer needed to be versatile to enable experimenting on numerous substrates.
• Should offer a quick turnaround to go from screen to wall.
• Should deliver life like prints with sharp lines, while maintaining vibrant color consistency, even in dark or sober colors, which must appear lustrous and visually pleasing.
• Chemical odors and hazardous pollutants during application were to be avoided at all costs.

It was also important to have sustainable technology that creates designs for today’s consumers while preserving the planet for future generations.

Thus began the search for a printer that could deliver on all these critical parameters.

HP Latex 700 W – creativity powered by Latex Technology

The journey from a hand-painted drawing to a digitally printed wallpaper had to bring alive the desires and aspirations of their clients. This influenced the decision of Life n Colors to invest in the HP Latex 700 W solely guided by the demands of their target segment – unique, intricate, and lifelike designs that appeared more like paintings rather than print as well as the ability to print on diverse substrates with white ink.

The HP Latex technology enabled them to carve out a niche for themselves amongst this unique and demanding target segment—by producing high-quality prints, roll after roll, on a wide range of media, textures, paper, etc., with astounding color consistency— broadening their offering to customers by 2x and boosting their business by 3x – all within 3 years.

HP Latex does not affect the glue on the material after printing, dries quickly, and has good ink followability, making it very suitable for printing wallpapers. HP Latex gave Life n Colors the scale and efficiency to expand its offerings from serving homes to including commercial clients as well.

Reveling in the freedom to experiment, pushing the boundaries of possibility, and expanding their offerings and customer base from India, Life n Colors is now present across 70 cities in India and also exports wallpapers to over 7 countries including France, UAE, and the USA. Their recent export was a beautiful foliage wallpaper that adorns the walls of a breathtaking Chateau in France. The client deeply appreciated the print quality and is looking forward to decorating more spaces with their wallpapers.

When they started, they were only able to print on non-woven paper and canvas due to color variation when switching to a new roll. The HP Latex 700 W with white ink enabled printing even on rare papers which is what their premium clients desired, with unmatched quality and consistency. At 334 ft2/hr., the fast throughput of the HP Latex 700 W means that the experiments can be conducted in real-time—printing, examining, and improving upon experimentative designs as they are being created.

Currently, they are printing on 11 different media, including on rare-to-find gold and silver sheets, this is made possible due to the Latex Ink technology which has special formulations that enable use of rare media. The team is constantly experimenting with encouraging results for their clients, brightening up people’s living spaces, the lives of growing children, premium public places, and so much more.

One of the key differentiators in favor of the Latex 700W are its water-based (upto 65% water), eco-conscious inks and prints that helped ensure that they could immediately apply their wallpapers without any harm to the health of room occupants.

Life n Colors takes pride in having earned the badge of an eco-certified supplier which means they are certified to supply wallpapers in the most regulated environments such as educational institutes and children’s rooms. The HP Latex 700 W enables this with its water-based inks which are odorless, clean, and non-toxic proven by the list of certifications earned including EPEAT, ENERGY STAR®, Nordic Swan Ecolabel, and the UL GREENGUARD GOLD ensuring its world class safety standards.

A key differentiator is also the ECOLOGO certification which is a life cycle-based environmental certification that indicate a product has undergone rigorous scientific testing and exhaustive auditing to prove its compliance with stringent, third-party environmental standards.

In today’s landscape, environmental certifications are considered a prerequisite for any growing business and Latex enabled us to tap into segments open only to Eco-certified suppliers. This helped expand business and confidence in becoming a vendor of choice and being able to match high standards of customer expectations.

White ink enabled sharper prints, and neater image outlines while adding more contrast with colored or dark designs, which is critical when it comes to rich Indian motifs .

For Life n Colors, the HP Latex 700 W had another unexpected benefit. While their designs could be plagiarized from their website, no one could replicate the print quality of the 700 W – this is where they gained the edge over the competition.

Powered by the HP PrintOS, the HP Latex 700 W is so easy to use that even without the technical know-how, he can operate it owing to the UI on its smart front panel that is very intuitive to use.

Life n Colors has come a long way since its humble beginnings. With clients such as The Claridges Hotel, Anita Dongre, and Suzanne Roshan, the brainchild of a designer and an entrepreneur has taken wings, backed by the wide-ranging capabilities of HP Latex 700W.

Their ability to combine a premium look and feel, with exotic Indian colors and patterns, backed by the high quality, color calibrated, easy-to-install HP Latex prints, have earned them a name across the globe.

Towards the beginning of 2021, Life n Colors earned an opportunity to bring alive the rich historical splendor of Delhi through their unique design sensibilities for the prestigious landmark of Delhi - The Claridges Hotel, New Delhi.

Utilizing thousands of square feet of walls as a canvas to bridge the past with the present was the perfect homage to all things Delhi. Revisiting the rustic charm of Delhi, the team crafted wallpaper designs to bring alive Indian heritage with hand-drawn sketches, recreating ancient maps and artworks. The prints produced looked like replicas of photographs demonstrating Delhi’s history over time, precise, antique, and nostalgic. This theme still adorns the Coffee shop, foyer areas, spa, and the presidential suite at the Claridges.

With white ink, the HP Latex 700 W was able to celebrate the historical magnificence of Delhi with ease. The customer marveled at the quality of the wallpaper—which appeared at first glance, to be hand-drawn. Today, not only does The Claridges, New Delhi proudly bear the designs of Life n Colors, but they have become regular client.

Life n Colors has its goal clear ahead of them, to be a leader in the premium wallpaper segment. With HP Latex supporting them in their journey, they are truly transforming India and the world, one wall at a time.

Majority of their business now comes from the residential sector vs 25% from commercial with 5% coming in from exports. Not only has the HP Latex 700 W helped Life n Colors realize its creativity, but it has also increased its productivity, opening new possibilities for businesses and customers alike.

The HP Latex 700 W matches the core values of Life n Colors, making ideas real, spaces meaningful, and sustainability, a priority.