We discuss a downsizing of optical components into the nanometer range. It presupposes the substitution of photons by ballistic electrons, but it also requires a simple and robust concept to assemble the analogues of basic electronic and optical components on such a tiny length scale. Here, one of the most promising candidate schemes employs graphene as a basic nanosubstrate. We elucidate the suggested behaviour of graphene as an electronic metamaterial [1], and show that other desired electronic or optical functionalities may be obtained through a patterning with sub-nanometer sized boron clusters [2].