Blog
October 11, 2026
A Universe on the Ceiling: 8 x 8 ft Fabric Light Boxes for Snowball Ice Cream, Wakad
Two 8 x 8 ft fabric light boxes in a ceiling, five glowing planets, a galaxy on the counter, and one old college friend doing his very best to make me bald.
Case study · Snowball Natural & Pure Icecream, Wakad
Every good story needs a hero and a villain
This one has both. The hero is an 8 ft x 8 ft fabric light box, and there are two of them. The villain is my friend Atul.
His wife, Bhavna, runs the Snowball Natural & Pure Icecream franchise in Vaastu Viva, Wakad. Bhavna is a very sweet lady. She called me, politely, to ask if we could do up the interiors of her ice cream shop. Then Atul took over. Bhavna asks. Atul informs.
The store
Snowball ice cream, Wakad
The hero
Two 8 x 8 ft fabric light boxes
The supporting cast
Planet lights, prints, gold letters
The villain
A friend of 35 years
Meet the villain
Thirty-five years of friendship. Thirty-five fewer hairs.
Atul and I were in college together three and a half decades ago, and our friendship has survived everything since. My hair has not.
God has a peculiar sense of humour. He has given me a lot of friends, and put each one on this earth with a single purpose: to test me, and to reduce the number of hairs on my already balding head. Atul takes his purpose very seriously.
He doesn't call to ask. He calls to inform. My schedule is now his schedule. His job jumps the queue. Mitesh Sanghani must personally look into every screw, every print and every LED, preferably by this evening. In thirty-five years he has never once asked, “When is convenient for you?” He doesn't twirl a moustache. He just sits on my chest until the work is done.
Exhibit A: Atul giving me a tel maalish on holiday. He looks gentle here. Don't be fooled. He's counting how many hairs are left to pull out.
More evidence
The usual suspects
For the record, these are some of my oldest and dearest friends. For the other record, look at their faces and tell me they aren't up to something.
Exhibit B
Me, Atul and Lalit on a night out, 2016. Two of us are innocent.
Exhibit C
Me, Atul, Kiran and Anup on a rock. The rock was the only one not making demands.
From my own albums. My friends have not seen this post yet. They will survive. My hair may not.
The brief
Take the universe and put it on the ceiling
Snowball's stores follow a space theme: “explore the ice-cream universe”. The architect had a brilliant idea. No ordinary lights in the ceiling. Instead, the universe would carry on overhead, glowing.
He handed me a design of space, planets and ice creams, and asked me to make a light box out of it. Most light boxes stop at 2 or 3 ft. He wanted 64 sq ft: 8 ft wide and 8 ft high. Then he said “two”. Somewhere in Wakad, I'm sure, Atul was rubbing his hands together.
The star of the show
What is a fabric light box, anyway?
Clients ask us about these often, so here is the whole thing, layer by layer. A fabric light box is three things working together: a print on stretchable fabric, an aluminium frame that holds it tight, and a bed of LEDs behind it.
Illustration (AI): the three parts pulled apart. The printed fabric at the front, the aluminium frame in the middle, the LED back panel at the rear.
The fabric
We print on Senfa, a stretchable fabric with a slightly satiny, silky feel, in vivid, high-resolution colour with UV inks on our wide-format machines.
The silicone edge
The printed fabric is stitched and seamed on all four sides, with a silicone strip sewn along the edges.
The frame
Anodised aluminium profiles, usually about 65 mm (2.5 in) deep, about 90 mm when a bigger box needs more depth. A groove inside takes the silicone edge. From the front you see only a slim metal edge, about 4-5 mm.
The light
LED modules fixed across an ACP panel at the back of the frame, so the whole print glows bright and even.
Push the silicone edge into the groove all the way round, and the fabric pulls as tight as the skin on a tabla: flat, creaseless, wrinkle-free.
Up close
The edge, the groove and the light
Here is each part on its own. The silicone strip is the secret: it is what turns a loose piece of printed fabric into a drum-tight glowing panel.
Our drawing: one edge of a fabric light box, cut through. Not to scale.
The silicone edge
A silicone strip stitched all along the edge of the printed fabric.
Into the groove
The strip is pressed into the groove of the aluminium frame, all the way round.
Behind the print
Rows of LED modules across the back panel, so the print lights up evenly.
The LEDs
LED modules and their wiring, under the lifted corner of a print.
Illustrations made with AI to show how a fabric light box is built. Not photos of our jobs: on ours, the aluminium edge you see at the front is about 4-5 mm.
The best part
Change the picture, keep the box
This is the part most people don't know. The print is held only by its silicone edge, so it pulls out of the groove as easily as it went in. The box stays where it is, on your wall or in your ceiling, wiring and all. Only the print on top changes.
New season, new menu, new offer, new collection: we print a new fabric, you press it into the same frame, and the box shows something new. No new box, no electrician, no mess. If only friends came with a silicone edge.
Buy the box once. Change the print whenever your story changes.
Pulling the old print out
Ease the silicone edge out of the groove. The LEDs and the frame stay put.
Same frame, new picture
A wildlife print going in where another one came out.
Illustrations made with AI to show how a fabric light box is built. Not photos of our jobs: on ours, the aluminium edge you see at the front is about 4-5 mm.
Not just ceilings
Where else a fabric light box works
We make fabric light boxes that hang on walls or sit in ceilings, like the ones at Snowball. Because the print stretches right to the edge, a row of them reads like a gallery of glowing pictures.
In a mall
Fashion prints in a row on a shopping mall wall.
On a wall
One large print, wall-mounted, above a sideboard.
Illustrations made with AI to show how a fabric light box is built. Not photos of our jobs: on ours, the aluminium edge you see at the front is about 4-5 mm.
Watch
A fabric light box, up close
A short look at one of our slim fabric light boxes: a high-resolution print on stretch fabric, held tight over an aluminium frame full of LEDs, about 2.5 inches deep.
Before it left our hands
On our floor first, then on their ceiling
A 64 sq ft box is not something you want to discover a problem with while standing on a ladder. So each one was assembled and lit up on our floor first. Here is each box in our workshop, next to the same box in the ceiling at Snowball.
Box one, on our floor
Stretched and lit in our workshop. Note the big red planet.
Box one, over the counter
The same box in the ceiling above the counter. Same red planet.
Box two, on our floor
Ice cream planets on their orbits. No wrinkles.
Box two, over the seating
Look up: the ringed purple scoop has found its orbit.
Workshop photos are ours; the ceiling photos show the store as it is today.
Up it goes
A 64 sq ft hole in the ceiling
On site, the ceiling was left open where the boxes would go. Look at the top of this photo: that gap is waiting for the universe.
While you're looking, spot the door on the left, standing open, with an astronaut floating on it. That's the door to the back room, printed with the same galaxy as the wall. Shut it, and it disappears. Atul has asked if we can do the same for his phone bill.
The boxes went up, the LEDs went on, and the ceiling stopped being a ceiling.
The supporting cast
Five planets that double as menus
Behind the counter hang five round light boxes, from 1 ft to 2.5 ft across. Each is acrylic with a black side channel and a white acrylic face, about 2.5 inches deep, packed with LEDs, with backlit vinyl on the face showing the flavours, each planet in its own colour. Same family as our lit sign boards.
Between the five planets and the two ceiling boxes, the store is flooded with light; the few downlights in the ceiling barely have anything left to do. If you ever lose your way in Wakad, follow the planets to the ice cream.
The counter
A counter that joined the galaxy
The counter front is wrapped in a print of the space theme in the brand colours, so the furniture becomes part of the universe instead of sitting in front of it. The wall behind the counter, door included, carries the space theme too, in printed vinyl.
On the counter sits the tagline, “explore the ice-cream universe”, cut on our laser from gold mirror acrylic, raised 3 mm, and fixed letter by letter. Our acrylic letters fixed straight on the wall are made the same way.
The verdict
The villain was right. Don’t tell him.
Here is the twist. Thanks to all of Atul's pushing, the job was done fast and done right, and Bhavna's customers now eat their ice cream under a galaxy.
So yes, in thirty-five years Atul has been right exactly once. I'm putting it in writing here because I know he'll never read a blog post this long. Atul, if you have somehow got this far: no, this does not mean your next job jumps the queue.
Most light boxes stop at 2 or 3 ft. This one is 64 sq ft, and there are two of them.
The specs
What went into the universe
Store
Snowball Natural & Pure Icecream, Vaastu Viva, Wakad, Pune (franchise), 2024
Ceiling
Two fabric light boxes, 8 ft x 8 ft each (64 sq ft): stretch fabric printed with UV inks, silicone edge, anodised aluminium frame about 65 mm deep, LEDs on an ACP back panel
Menu boards
Five round light boxes, 1 ft to 2.5 ft across: black side channel, white acrylic face, about 2.5 in deep, backlit vinyl print
Counter and wall
Printed space-theme vinyl in the brand colours, over the door too
Tagline
“explore the ice-cream universe”, laser-cut gold mirror acrylic, raised 3 mm
Villain
Atul (a friend of 35 years, unrepentant)
Want one?
What a fabric light box costs
Fabric light boxes are made to size, from a small wall panel to a ceiling like this one, so we quote each one on its size, depth and where it goes. Send us your artwork and the size of the space, and we'll make a proposal.
Good to know
What to send us
Your artwork or idea, the size you want, and a photo of the wall or ceiling.
Depth
About 65 mm (2.5 in) as standard; about 90 mm for bigger boxes.
Lead time
Fabricated pieces typically take 1-15 days after you approve the proposal.
Installation
In Pune, quoted separately once we have seen the site.
Changing the print later
The box stays; we print a new fabric and it presses into the same frame.
Planning a store with a theme? Send us the drawings and we'll make a free proposal for every sign and light in it.
Before you go
Look up next time you’re in Wakad
See every photo on the Snowball job page, and if you'd like to see how the boxes are built, take a look at our workshop.
More ice cream, more signs
Case study
A sign that looks like it’s melting
Pink “melt” boards for Delrico Creamery’s ice cream outlets across Pune.
Read the story →Case study
Every sign in a Häagen-Dazs café
Made in Pune, fitted overnight in a Mumbai mall.
Read the story →Your turn
Want a universe on your ceiling?
Send us your artwork and the size of the space on WhatsApp. No villains required.
Looking for any specific product?
Drop us a line. Send us your query. And we’ll get back to you with solutions and answers.
Mitesh Sanghani
Mitesh lives, mostly for Saturdays.
But when forced to work, you’ll find him heading Orchid Digitals – a printing press in Pune.
If it’s an emergency, try looking for him in the hills behind his house. You’ll almost certainly find him… lazing under a tree, with a book in hand.
