Xorel Goes to School: One Material, More Possibilities

The campus experience is changing. Learning no longer begins and ends in the classroom. It happens in libraries and lounges, residence halls and student commons, innovation hubs, cafés, corridors, and all the spaces in between.

At the same time, colleges and universities are navigating tighter budgets, evolving student expectations, and growing pressure to make the spaces they already have work harder.

If education spaces are being asked to do more, the materials inside them need to do more, too.

Enter Xorel®.

For more than four decades, Xorel has brought together performance, design, and material innovation in one remarkably versatile textile. 

The bigger opportunity? Seeing just how many places Xorel can go.

Xorel Fractal Emboss and Xorel Meteor at Rutgers Newark Dana Library

Xorel can move from walls to upholstery, wrap acoustical panels, become Xorel Artform, cover tackable surfaces, and extend overhead through acoustical ceiling applications. Unbacked Xorel is acoustically transparent to varying degrees by pattern, allowing it to wrap acoustic substrates without getting in the way of the performance underneath.

The versatility is particularly valuable in education, where one building may need to support quiet focus in the morning, group collaboration in the afternoon, and community events later that evening.

Rather than approaching each application as a completely separate material decision, Xorel gives designers the opportunity to create connections across a space.

If Xorel works in one place, why not ask where else it can go?

Wallcovering Xorel Aperture Embroider

Think about a typical day on campus. A student might begin in a residence hall, meet friends in a student commons, head to class, spend the afternoon studying in the library, and finish the day working with a group in a collaboration space.

Each environment serves a different purpose, but the need for thoughtful, high-performing design follows them throughout the day.

In a student commons, Xorel can move from wallcovering to upholstered seating, helping create visual continuity across spaces designed for gathering.

In a library or study area, Xorel can wrap acoustical and tackable panels that support focus while still contributing color, pattern, and texture to the environment.

In lecture and collaboration spaces, Xorel can be applied as upholstered and moveable walls that work together to address the realities of active, high-use spaces.

In residence halls and lounges, Xorel upholstery offers indoor to outdoor performance to spaces that are expected to feel comfortable and inviting.

And throughout corridors, ceilings, partitions, and other high-traffic areas, the possibilities continue.

The point isn’t to put the same textile everywhere. It’s to recognize Xorel as a material platform that can move throughout an entire project, adapting to the needs of each space while giving designers a common language to work from.

Xorel Artform Rise 3D Tile in Xorel Strie

At the University of South Carolina’s Campus Village, Xorel’s versatility becomes tangible.

Within the project, Xorel moves across multiple applications—from the wall to banquette seating to Xorel Artform. Rather than limiting the material to one surface or one function, the installation demonstrates how Xorel can help create continuity throughout an education environment while allowing each application to serve a different purpose.

Xorel on the wall → Xorel on upholstery → Xorel Artform

One material. Multiple applications. One connected environment.

It’s a simple example of a much bigger idea. Xorel’s versatility isn’t hypothetical. It’s already at work across campus.

University of South Carolina Campus Village 2025 Installation

Education interiors are demanding environments.

Students are sitting on, leaning against, toughing, and moving through these spaces all day, every day. Materials need to stand up to that reality, which means durability, cleanability, maintenance, acoustics, and longevity aren’t secondary considerations. They’re part of the design brief from the beginning.

But high performance shouldn’t automatically translate to spaces that feel hard, standardized, or institutional.

That’s where Xorel gives designers room to play.

Across hundreds of colors, patterns, textures, and constructions, Xorel can introduce everything from quiet texture to expressive color while delivering the durability and cleanability expected in demanding commercial environments. Many Xorel constructions are also available across multiple applications, making it possible to carry a design idea through a space rather than starting over at every surface.

And when the right solution doesn’t already exist, customization opens another door. Color, pattern, scale, and application can become opportunities to create something more specific to a school’s identity and community.

Performance can be beautiful. Education spaces shouldn’t have to choose between the two.

Carnegie + Modernfold Upholstered Panels in Xorel Galway

There is another side to material performance that matters in education: what students, faculty, and staff are surrounded by every day.

A textile isn’t experienced for five minutes. Students may spend hours studying beside it, sitting on it, gathering around it, and moving through spaces where it covers entire walls or helps manage sound.

So the question shouldn’t only be, Will this material survive?

We should also be asking, What are we asking people to live with every day?

Carnegie’s approach to Xorel has long considered both questions. Made from polyethylene, Xorel draws its strength, flexibility, and performance from the material itself. Our “no finish is the best finish” philosophy prioritizes performance qualities that are inherent to a material’s composition or construction, reducing the need for added treatments or topical finishes.

Xorel is finish-free and made without added antimicrobial finishes or additives. Carnegie’s products are also made without added PFAS, and Carnegie does not formulate or sell products that contain PVC.

Biobased Xorel takes the material story further by incorporating polyethylene derived from rapidly renewable sugarcane. Qualifying construction is supported by third-party certifications and transparent documentation, giving designers more information to consider alongside aesthetics and performance when making material decisions.

Because in spaces dedicated to helping the next generation learn and grow, what we put into those environments matters.

Xorel

A campus doesn’t stop needing attention once the ribbon is cut.

Education designers are creating for opening day, but facilities teams will be maintaining those spaces for years to come. That makes the maintenance and operations budget an important part of the material conversation from the very beginning.

Walls are a good example. In busy corridors, commons, residence halls, and other high-use environments, damage can quickly turn into an ongoing cycle or patching, repainting, and replacement. Planning for wallcovering at the start of a project can help institutions think beyond the initial material cost and consider what a surface will require over its lifetime.

Xorel is designed for the longer view. Its inherent durability, bleach cleanability, and 10-year warranty help support spaces expected to perform well beyond their first semester.

And that’s an important part of the sustainability conversation, too.

What a material is made from matters. How long it stays in use matters, too.

For education institutions balancing ambitious design goals with real operational budgets, longevity can turn a material decision into a long-term investment.

Explore Carnegie’s long-term cost analysis on high-performance wallcoverings vs paint.

Moveable Walls in Xorel

Once you stop thinking of Xorel as one type of surface, the possibilities get much bigger.

A tackable panel in a study room? Xorel can go there.

Indoor-outdoor spaces that extend learning beyond the building? Xorel can go there.

Architectural doors, movable walls, and partitions that allow spaces to change throughout the day? Through applications and partnerships such as Carnegie + Modernfold, Xorel can go there, too.

And there are familiar ones:

Wall? Xorel can go there.

Seating? Xorel can go there.

Acoustics? Xorel can go there.

Ceiling? Xorel can go there.

The opportunity isn’t simply to specify Xorel in more places. It’s to think differently about what one material can accomplish across an education environment.

As campuses evolve to support more ways of learning, gathering, collaborating, and belonging, materials have an opportunity to evolve with them. Xorel brings together aesthetics, performance, acoustics, longevity, and thoughtful material choices in a single platform—giving designers more possibilities without asking them to compromise what matters.

So, where can Xorel go next?

What makes Crush particularly meaningful is that it builds upon Carnegie's long-standing legacy of material innovation while viewing it through a different lens. The performance, durability, and sustainability standards that have always defined the company remain firmly intact. What changes is the emotional experience.

"At its core, Crush is still very much Carnegie," says Aliesha. "But it celebrates creativity in a more expressive way. We wanted designers to feel excited by the possibilities."

That excitement became a guiding principle throughout the collection's development.

Every palette was chosen to encourage exploration. Every pattern was designed to work beautifully on its own, but even better together. Every material was selected to help designers create spaces that feel personal, memorable, and full of life.

Ultimately, Crush is less about a specific look and more about a mindset. It's about trusting your instincts and finding confidence in experimentation. Because when color, pattern, and texture come together in just the right way, something special happens. Everything clicks.

Brooke Kanell is a Content Marketing Specialist at Carnegie, where she creates content that brings the brand’s materials and stories to life. With a background in marketing and a passion for all things creative, she enjoys sharing the inspiration, people, and ideas shaping Carnegie’s work. Brooke’s goal is to make design feel engaging, welcoming, and easy to connect with.