Every year, Ikea releases a limited-collection of rugs designed by a handful of contemporary artists. This year, the collection featured eight designs, by creatives including Virgil Abloh and Misaki Kawai.
The rugs are designed to be sold at an accessible price for all art lovers. In Belgium, only 109 rugs were available to buy. To avoid a repeat of past limited-edition launches, when opportunistic buyers bought rugs in bulk in order to re-sell them on eBay at inflated prices, Ikea in Belgium worked with Ogilvy Brussels to create Ikea (He)art Scanner, an initiative that ran during the brand’s week-long art event.
Between 7 to 11 May, prospective rug buyers could view the rugs on display at an Ikea store in Anderlecht, Brussels. Each person was given a headset fitted with an EEG device, which detects electrical activity in the brain, and each device was adapted to an algorithm developed by the brand to measure beta and gamma brain waves, electrical body responses and heart rate in real time.
