Sim Racing Room Decor
A rig is built one part at a time (wheel, pedals, seat, screens), and the room around it is usually the last thing to catch up. This guide is about that room: what to hang on each wall, how big to go, which colors hold up when the lights are low, and how to build a wall that grows with every season you race.
Start from the seat
Plan the room from the place where you spend your hours: the seat. From there, each wall has a different job.
- The wall in front of you is mostly screen. With three monitors or an ultrawide, most of it disappears behind the display, and what stays in view is the band above the screens.
- The side walls sit in your peripheral vision on every lap, often just a few feet away. This is where the detail of a piece pays off: you see it up close, between sessions, again and again.
- The wall behind the seat is the one you never see while driving, and often the first one everyone else sees: whoever walks through the door and, if you stream or record your races, the camera.
Size each wall for the distance it is seen from
The farther away a wall is read from, the larger the piece on it needs to be. Paddock Atlas posters come in four sizes, and each one has a natural place around a rig:
- A4, 8.3 × 11.7 in (21 × 29.7 cm): a shelf, or the desk beside the screens, within arm’s reach.
- A3, 11.7 × 16.5 in (29.7 × 42 cm): the side walls, seen from the seat. Best in a row of two or three.
- A2, 16.5 × 23.4 in (42 × 59.4 cm): the band above the screens, where height runs short, or a pair on a side wall.
- A1, 23.4 × 33.1 in (59.4 × 84.1 cm): the centerpiece, on the wall behind the seat or facing the door, read from across the room.
Measure the band above your screens before you choose. Every poster hangs in portrait, so an A1 is 33.1 inches (84.1 cm) tall before any frame, and it needs air above and below to look chosen rather than squeezed in.
Then hang it for the eyes that will read it. Galleries usually place the center of a work about 57 inches (145 cm) from the floor, for a visitor standing up. On the side walls of a sim room you mostly look from the seat, so bring the center down toward your eye level when seated.
Choose the edition for the light
Many sim rooms run dark. The screens are the main light, sometimes with an LED strip behind them, and the walls spend most of a session in shadow. Every circuit comes in four editions, and in a room like that the light counts as much as your favorite colors.
- Blueprint: deep technical navy. It reads as an engineering drawing: the edition for a rig corner that works like a workshop, under cool white light.
- Heritage: deep racing green. Warm light, wood and leather bring it to life; it suits a sim corner that shares the room with a sofa or a bookshelf.
- Rosso: burgundy red. The edition that draws the eye first; give it the wall behind the seat, the one the camera sees (and, often, whoever comes in).
- Midnight: pure black. In a dark room it merges with the shadows and a black rig frame, and what is left on the wall is the cream drawing.
Keep the screens out of the glass
Screens and LED strips light everything in front of them, and anything glossy sends that light straight back. The posters are printed on matte, museum-quality paper that scatters light instead of mirroring it, so an unframed print can hang on any wall, even the one the screens face. Framed posters have a plexiglass front, lighter than glass and far less likely to break, but like any glazing it can catch reflections: hang them on the side walls, or wherever the screens don’t point straight at them, and check the angle from the seat with the screens on.
One drawing language on every wall
A wall of posters works when it reads as one set. Every Paddock Atlas print shares the same engineering language: the full layout to scale with its named corners lettered in, plus coordinates, a compass and a scale bar. Different circuits sit together naturally, and keeping them in one edition finishes the job.
Three arrangements that suit a racing room:
- The centerpiece: one A1, centered on the rig or on the seat.
- The row: two or three A3s at the same height, 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 cm) apart, along a side wall.
- The grid: four A3s in a square. One season, four circuits.
Before you drill, cut paper to the size of each poster and fix it to the wall with painter’s tape. Run a session with it there: within an hour you will know whether the size and the height are right.
Choose circuits that mean something
The best racing room is personal. Hang the circuit where you found your last tenth, the one you raced through the night with your league, the local track you can drive for real, or the one you have never driven and one day will.
Starting from a blank wall, a few groups make natural sets:
- A first season: Lime Rock Park, Summit Point, Okayama and Oulton Park.
- Racing into the night: Circuit de la Sarthe (Le Mans), Daytona, Spa-Francorchamps and Sebring.
- Climbs and drops: Laguna Seca and its Corkscrew, Mount Panorama, Road Atlanta and Circuit of the Americas.
- Old-school classics: Monza, Silverstone, Suzuka and Watkins Glen.
Circuits to start with
Ready to hang, and within reach
Two more ways to bring the circuits into the room. Several of them also come framed and ready to hang, in A3, A2 or A1, with a black, white, natural wood or dark wood frame. And, off the wall, the coaster packs put four circuits in ceramic on the desk or the side table by the rig: the track within reach of your hand during a long stint.
Questions about decorating a sim racing room
- What size poster works best in a sim racing room?
- It depends on the distance each wall is seen from. An A1 suits the wall behind the seat or facing the door, an A2 the band above the screens, A3s in a row the side walls, and an A4 a shelf or desk within arm’s reach.
- Will a poster reflect my monitors?
- Not an unframed one: the posters are printed on matte paper, which scatters light instead of mirroring it, so the screens don’t show on it even on the wall they face. Framed posters have a plexiglass front, which can pick up reflections like any glazing, so they look best on a wall the screens don’t face directly.
- Which edition works best in a dark room?
- Blueprint and Midnight are the most at home in a dark room around a rig. Heritage and Rosso come into their own in warmer spaces, with wood, leather or warm light.
- Can I mix different circuits on the same wall?
- Yes. Every poster is drawn in the same engineering language, so different circuits sit well together. Keep them in one edition, and in one size or a clear pattern of sizes, and the wall reads as a set.