HomeNewsSustainable robotic textile at Fair FashionTech

Sustainable robotic textile at Fair FashionTech

From high-tech robot vest to personalised footwear. During Fair FashionTech, on 8 February, at DesignLab University of Twente, researchers and fashion experts took the audience on a tour of the latest developments in the field of smart textiles and wearable technology. The central theme of Fair FashionTech: How to make the world of textile – one of the most polluting industries on earth – more sustainable? Some highlights of the event.

“I was the last person in my class to get a smartphone,” Hellen van Rees confesses, to the amusement of everyone present. The fashion designer from Twente nevertheless plays a key role in the development of the high-tech robot vest for posture correction, together with researchers Geke Ludden and Angelika Mader. Attracting the attention of fashion techies and regional and national media during Fair FashionTech, the trio launched their prototype for the project ‘Textile Reflexes,’ part of the EU Horizon 2020 project WEARSustain.

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The fabric for the robot vest was Hellen's idea. “I like to create new fabrics from unusual materials, with sustainability in mind.” One of her ideas was to make moveable squares out of waste textile.

Researcher Geke Ludden says that she and her colleague Mader were fascinated by the material. "We thought it offered many possibilities. It raised the question how moveable textile can be used to provide tactile feedback to the wearer."

The researchers deemed posture correction a case fit for protoyping. Mader and Ludden added design improvements and hardware. Electronics and a small computer in the clothing enable the moveable squares to contract. When relevant, the robot vest literally (subtly) pushes you to improve your posture.

In addition to the robot vest, other prototypes in the area of smart textiles and wearable technology are presented during Fair FashionTech. For example, intelligent denim (Pauline van Dongen), bio-responsive fashion (Kristin Neidlinger), smart athleisure fashion (Marina Toeters, Melissa Bonvie & Margreet de Kok), and smart footwear (Troy Nachtigall).

RELATIONSHIP

The pitches for the prototypes were followed by a panel discussion with Hellen van Rees, Valérie Lamontagne and Oscar Tomico. “Sustainable textile sounds like a contradictio in terminis,” are Lamontage’s opening words.

Designer and scientist Lamontagne predicts that the solution does niet lie in recycling, but in a changed attitude among consumers towards textile. “Perhaps a time will come when we only wear one or two items of clothing in our entire lives, because the material is designed in such a way that it meets all our needs.” Designer Van Rees adds: “These days, many people buy a product they do not relate to. They merely buy the product because it is cheap.”

Assistant Professor of Industrial Design Oscar Tomico expects that the use of more local expertise and local products will help create a relationship with textile.

FUTURE

The panel discussion triggered reactions from the audience. “We are talking about how the consumers’ attitude towards textile needs to change. Does not the industry also have a duty to make their processes more sustainable?”

A good question, according to Lamontagne. “I think that one of the great developments in recent years is that the industry is already changing. When you talk to industry experts about wearable technology now, they no longer think you are am mad,” she adds, laughingly. “They are interested. This offers great prospects for the future.”

Fair FashionTech was initiated by designer Hellen van Rees, researchers Geke Ludden and Angelika Mader (pictured above from left to right), and facilitated by DesignLab University of Twente.

Photo credits: Gerieke ter Denge-Pluimers, DesignLab University of Twente