Sunday, August 19, 2007
Amanda Parkes at Unravel Fashion Show at SIGGRAPH 2007
A conversation with Amanda Parkes, fashion chair and curator of the Unravel fashion and technology show, at SIGGRAPH 2007 in San Diego, California.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
A conversation with Maggie Orth and Joel Kollin in Seattle tomorrow (August 1, 2007)
If you’re in Seattle, Washington tomorrow night, the McLeod Residence art gallery is hosting an event with Maggie Orth (International Fashion Machines) and Joel Kollin.
Maggie Orth is an artist, technologist, and entrepreneur who creates and invents interactive and electronic textiles. Orth is considered a pioneer in the emerging field of electronic textiles, interactive fashions, wearable computing, and interface design. Her groundbreaking work in electronic textiles has been published and exhibited in a range of venues worldwide.
Joel S. Kollin is a Ph.D. student at the University of Washington’s Center for Digital Arts and Experimental Media. Contextures is his series of work that engages the viewer’s visual system by challenging its ability to form a stable image.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
SIGGRAPH 2007 coverage from San Diego the first week of August
We will be at SIGGRAPH in San Diego this year and focused on video so check back here or on the YouTube channel for coverage. If you have a project in the show and are attending and would like to chat with us, please drop me an email at alexa@artfuture.com. See you there! Alexa
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Nokia’s wearable Wibree technology to be included in Bluetooth SIG
Nokia sparked some interest when it unveiled Wibree last year because of the niche it filled: wireless technology with miserly power use that could fit in a tiny form factor, like wearable items.
AgResearch high-tech textiles fit for 007
If you’re in New Zealand, check out what’s happening at the National Fieldays Ag Art wear competition this week. If you take some video, I’d love to see these in action!
On display will be a machine-washable suit that, in a world first, is made from 100 per cent wool without the use of any chemicals, is shrink resistant, has high natural stretch and a lively drape.
AgResearch’s Wearable Science demonstration will have a ‘James Blonde’ theme. Several of the garments showcased would not look out of place on the set of an 007 movie. These include a puncture resistant vest that is made from Aramid-knitted material packed with short wool fibres to resist puncture that is lightweight and comfortable to wear. The fabric will withstand knife attack and severe temperature ‘flashover’ without causing serious injury.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Marks and Spencer iPod Suit
This is an interesting way to hide the technology if you want a more traditional look with clean lines yet access to the latest technology. They partnered with Eleksen for the control pad.
Marks & Spencer iPod suit has a ‘smart-fabric’ control pad for the MP3 player sewn into the left lapel, allowing the wearer to adjust the level of sound and to skip through tracks.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Roll Phone Concept by Tao Ma
Here is another great concept from designer Tao Ma. When the roll phone is closed, it looks like a film canister. To make or take a call, you pull out the the screen and then roll it back up when you’re done. It’s small enough to put in a pocket, on a key ring or hang on your wrist.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
1881 - Lindsey Pickett’s prototype digital camera locket
There have been times in history when lockets were the “it” thing to wear along with cameos and other heirloom items. Lindsey Pickett, a senior in Design at the University of Cincinnati, revisits this past and updates it for the future in the form of the ‘1881” prototype locket which was designed as part of a Kodak sponsored studio on the future of wearable computing in the Fall of 2006. It functions just like a digital camera and photo album but is in a more personal and decorative form.
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Victimless leather jacket prototype grown from living cells
While this project is conceptual rather than commercial, I’m posting it here instead of artfuture as it raises some great ideas about how we might view clothing as biotech matures.
By growing Victimless Leather, the Tissue Culture & Art (TC&A) Project is further problematising the concept of garment by making it Semi-Living.
The Victimless Leather is grown out of immortalised cell lines which cultured and form a living layer of tissue supported by a biodegradable polymer matrix in a form of miniature stich-less coat like shape. The Victimless Leather project concerns with growing living tissue into a leather like material.
This artistic grown garment will confront people with the moral implications of wearing parts of dead animals for protective and aesthetic reasons and will further confront notions of relationships with living systems manipulated or otherwise. An actualized possibility of wearing ‘leather’ without killing an animal is offered as a starting point for cultural discussion.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Pulse Bicycle Helmet Student Design Concept
The Pulse Bicycle Helmet by student designer, Julie-Ann Davies, is a finalist in the Australian Design Awards.
Rider activities and tasks such as listening to music, engaging a mobile phone or recording and retrieving cycling data have now been streamlined into the Pulse Bicycle Safety Helmet by the addition of the Ear Drop feature. Located only on the non-road side ear so that the oncoming traffic can still be heard, the Ear Drop allows riders to perform their desired riding related activities more easily and quickly, minimising the risk of a fatality.
Rider safety has not been compromised in this helmet design, where built-in lighting (LED’s) and reflective surface materials have been employed to enhance rider presence on the road. Greater weather protection is also gained by the employment of a new internal ventilation system where the outer surface is closed and air tunnels are established to cool the rider. This also allows riders to personalise the outer surface colour and trim.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
CTIA 2007 Fashion in Motion Show
Update: See Video at CNET
Update: Ozan Cakmakci, a student at the University of Central Florida, has won the Fashion in Motion Scholarship this year for his design of an eyeglass display. See his design among others in Elle Magazine’s photo gallery of the show.
Update: Here is Phlipper’s Photostream of the show on Flickr.
I wasn’t able to attend CTIA this year so I’ll have to reblog some of the best coverage of the Fashion in Motion show. Check out these pictures from Extreme Tech:
Other items featured are:
The Zegna iJacket which features Eleksen’s ElekTex technology in the sleeve to control your iPod.
The GTech Professional Messenger bag is the first iPod control speaker pack with ElekTex smart fabric technology.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
ForceWear Vest from TN Games lets you feel simulated bullets
Wearing the ForceWear Vest you can now feel every impact, front and back, from game generated gunfire, body slams, G-forces, or any other type of physical event.
NASA developing new space duds
Astronaut apparel has evolved over the decades from 1960s-era aluminum foil-style outfits to the bulky, 275-pound whites now used on jaunts outside the space station.
NASA engineers at Houston’s Johnson Space Center are hard at work on updating the look even further.
While it is too early in the design process to know what the new suits will look like, the space agency is hoping for something both high-tech and low-maintenance.
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Aurora Jewelry by Kyeok Kim
Love this idea…
‘Aurora’ creates patterns of light on the body as ornamentation, extending the ornamented space around the body and restyling its decorative silhouette by motion. ‘Aurora’ highlights the relationship between different pieces of jewellery, by its nature the pieces interact with the another. To operate the decorative light, one must gently move the ring (containing a magnet) towards the main jewellery piece.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Philips’ Patent Application for Auto-snug Clothing
Philips hopes that fitting-room fiascos will become a thing of the past if it ever forays into the world of fashion. The consumer electronics giant has come up with a way to change the size, shape and style of clothes by weaving “muscle wires” into the fabric. The wires are made of shape-memory alloys that change length according to the small current passed through them.
See the patent application