High pressure upward drafts, in conjunction with wall-mounted, outbound fans. Close the subject room's doors from the outside and flip the switch, located either immediately outside the room or at a control center. Presumably, the elements would take care of the piles of cruft that would start mounting up immediately below the fans on the outside. Alternatively, strap on your big inflatable shoes for life-sized indoor air hockey.
Also great for harrowing the pets.-- absterge, Dec 23 2000 I wonder if you could just have the upward forced air and have a layer of carpet debris floating in the air. Might look cool.-- nick_n_uit, Dec 23 2000 The council housing I rented in Thetford, England, had this. Only the upward drafts were caused by Winter wind sweeping down the garage alley-way into the back of the building, and out the roof by the cistern. Upstairs carpets magically shook themselves clean.-- wasraw, Dec 23 2000 I actually did something very close to this the other day with a leaf blower. It was a sunny and windy day and I could see a lot of dust floating in the air of the (carpeted) room. So I removed all light items from the top of the dresser, opened the windows, and turned on the leaf blower.
Over the next 15 minutes I was able to figure out a procedure that removed an enormous amount of dust from the room. Starting in the "upwind" part of the room, blast the things high in the room (e.g. curtains, top of armoire). Then blast under the dressers, under the bed, the bookshelf, etc. - places you cannot reach with the vacuum. You will see an amazing amount of dust kicked up from under the furniture that is on short legs. Try to keep the dust "live" (airborne) as you point the blast toward one of the "downwind" windows. Repeat this process several times and you will notice the density of dust going way down. After 15 minutes of this, only the heaviest, stickiest dust remains, which can be wiped up with a cloth.-- davem, Feb 24 2005 random, halfbakery