Applied Media rolls out blue walkway for Oxford Cambridge Boat Race

Applied Media recently produced printed walkways for this year's BNY Mellon Boat Race, allowing crews from Oxford and Cambridge universities to walk across branded panels from the boathouse to the Thames slipway.

The large format graphic panels were printed using a Fujifilm Acuity Advance HS UV digital flatbed machine with flexible UV cure inks which were ideal for the polymeric base media. The printed graphics were protected with a propriety laminate and incorporated crystalline aggregate.

Because the walkway had to be highly durable, coping with a wet environment and heavy pedestrian footfall, Applied Media adapted their surface graphics system to provide two branded walkways, each around four metres wide and 16 metres long.

Business development director Larry Walsh said: "The graphics are usually applied internally or externally directly to the substrate and easily removed after use. In this instance though the graphics were adhered to a rubber backing enabling them to be rolled out very quickly and later cleaned and rolled up to be used again."

A spokesman for Applied Media could not confirm how much the graphics cost, because it was specialist job, but said for standard format panels the cost would be £80 per sqm for the printed media, supply only.

The Applied Media system has previously been installed at airports, motorway service stations and retail centres.

"Our parent company working with TfL delivered the 120 kilometres of temporary games lanes for the 2012 London Olympics and Paralympics last summer," said Walsh.

"The base technology and experience gained in that type of environment has been the inspiration behind the overall development of this branding system."