computational couture: wearable digital technology fashion design

Mobile computing, handheld gaming, geolocation technologies and multimedia music players are intricately woven into the fabric of our culture, and now they are making their way into our clothes.

From miniaturized processors and embedded electronics, to luminous fabrics made from fiber optics and clothes that change color or have hemlines that rise and fall at the touch of a button. As we become increasingly inseparable from our cellphones, laptops, and mp3 players—interest in wearable computing is growing—and those at the forefront are getting mainstream media coverage. Fashion designers experimenting with and embracing connective threads are definitely being taken more seriously by the mainstream fashion industry and by digital culture creatives and marketers.

High tech designer Hussein Chalayan was awarded the title British Designer of the Year in 2009—the second time he has been thus recognized. Closer to home, this summer, Canadian designer Ying Gao was awarded a $10,000 grant from the City of Montreal to continue her work creating “modulatable” garments at the University of Quebec at Montreal. As reported by The Toronto Star, there are numerous examples of the fusion of technology and fashion at the cutting edge of clothing and dress design here in Canada.

In the US, this year some graduate students at the MIT Media Lab took the TED talks by storm when they unveiled their wearable computing system which will turn any surface into an interactive display screen. As described in Wired, the project in ubiquitous computing aimed to make digital information retrieval and communication into an unconscious act, a sixth sense for humans. “We wanted to make information more useful to people in real time with minimal effort in a way that doesn’t require any behavior changes,” an MIT spokesperson said.

At the bleeding edge of textile research are forays into the development of responsive fabrics. “Imagine if your clothing could alter the feeling of a room when you walk in, to suit your preferences,” writes journalist Raymond Oliver for the UK Telegraph. Oliver reports on research currently being conducted at the University of Bath and London College of Fashion into clothing that heats or cools in response to temperature changes in the environment.

This experimental research into smart fashion, connected couture, and digital wearables can only increase the naturalness of being always-on.

Related:

The most comprehensive coverage of trends in wearable electronics I’ve found is: Talk2MyShirt

Wearable Technology: Powered Art and Fashion Design 2009: a slideshow of gallery exhibition on Flickr from Netherlands Media Art Institute

and Fashionable Technology video (below)

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