Remember those kitsch bracelets from the 90s that changed color based on your skin temperature? Someone thought to apply the same principle to our homes, and that someone is not just anyone. Joe doucet, visionary industrial designer, has developed a paint thermochromic which could radically transform the way buildings interact with their environment.
Imagine a house that “blackens” when it’s cold to absorb heat, and turns white when the thermometer rises to reject it. This isn’t science fiction: it’s materials science applied to sustainable architecture.
Thermochromic paint, architecture breathes with the seasons
It's no mystery that the color of buildings affects the internal temperature. Research confirms what is already obvious to everyone: white surfaces reflect heat, while black ones absorb it. This is why in Greece, houses are predominantly white, while in Scandinavia they often opt for dark shades. But what happens in those regions where temperatures fluctuate drastically between winter and summer?
Doucet's thermochromic paint solves this dilemma: Below about 25°C, the building maintains a dark color to capture heat; when the temperature rises above this threshold, it magically lightens to reject it. It's like having a building that changes skin with the seasons, without any human or mechanical intervention.
It’s amazing to think of an environment that changes with the seasons just like nature does.
A home experiment becomes innovation
It makes me smile to think that it all started with a simple domestic dilemma. Doucet was renovating his house in Chappaqua, New York, and couldn’t decide what color to paint it. So he built two scale models of his home, one black and one white, and monitored the temperatures inside and outside for a year.
The results? Impressive. The White House in Summer it was 12°C cooler than the black one, while in winter the black one was 7°C warmer than the white one. The logical conclusion would have been: paint the house white in the summer and black in the winter. But since this was not practicable, here is the intuition of the paint that changes color by itself.
Thermochromic paint, from formula to market
Developing a paint that changes color without degrading was quite a challenge. If you've ever owned photochromic glasses that got stuck on the dark side (me) you understand the problem. After numerous attempts and about 100 test models, the design team found a formula which maintains its thermochromic properties intact for at least one year.
The “secret sauce,” as Doucet jokingly calls it, is now patent pending. He doesn’t plan to launch a paint company; instead, he’s thinking of licensing the formula to existing manufacturers. The estimated cost is 3 to 5 times higher than a standard paint, but the energy savings of 20-30% would allow the investment to be quickly amortized.
A colorful future (or maybe not)
Imagine entire cities changing color with the seasons, like artificial forests. Industrial structures, refrigerated warehouses, greenhouses: the potential applications are vast. If airports and municipalities around the world are already experimenting with “super white” paints reflective to combat urban heat islands, thermochromic paint could offer an even more efficient solution.
And Doucet? Don’t laugh: In the end he painted his house black. “I couldn’t wait for the patent,” he says. Who knows if soon we will all no longer have to choose between black and white. Nature, once again, teaches us that adapting is better than resisting.
