Generative Wardrobe by designer Alex Dodge is a concept study that explores various wearable technologies to form a complete system from head to the toes.

Starting with a highly futuristic head cap called ‘Sleep Talker‘ envisioned to allow the broadcasting of one’s unconscious experience = dreams on social networks. Facebook with a dream status update – how does this sound?

Haptic-Synth is an undergarment type of thin shirt embedded with with an array of Haptic-Synth ‘cells’. Each cell contains a compression touch sensor coupled with a miniature haptic feedback actuator. The Haptic-Synth shirt acts as gesture based input and feedback device for the complete wearable technology system.

A light, cross-seasonal jacket called Wearable Interface explores the possibilities of embedding mobile technologies in a ardent serving as CPU for future wearable technology systems.

The jacket’s on-board processor with connections to USB ports, GPS, accelerometers, microphones, temperature or photo sensors, can be trained and programmed to interact with a range of other devices.

Last but not least interesting is the Powerstep, a pair of nicely design shoes converting mechanical energy via piezoelectric ceramic components inside the sole into electric current with each step.

[TomsGuide via GizmoWatch]

According to a job opening posting the Adidas Group is looking for a Textronics Senior Industrial Designer ‘to create wearable electronics performance innovations which drive the advanced product process from opportunity identification through production reality.’

Textronics, founded by Stacey Burr, created and commercialized a range of heart rate monitoring running tops and shirts using their patented textile electrodes.

Adidas acquired Textronics a few years ago and in turn launched Adidas branded runner tops and shirts with the same, textile electrodes seamlessly woven into the garment.

Adidas made some small steps into the wearable technology arena most with iconic concept products like the Adidas 1 high-tech sneaker or more recently the Adidas Cyber Sneakers.

This job opening does suggest that Adidas is planning to get more active in integrating technology in their product range as one of the key areas for the future Senior Industrial Designer will be to ‘Design and develop cutting edge product innovations that lead the wearable sports electronics category innovation agendas.’

From (my) wearable technology perspective this is interesting news as it suggests that a top brand in the sports apparel market will certainly lead to surprisingly innovative, technology enhanced fitness outfit in the near future.

Imagine a pickpocket trying to steal your wallet but instead of getting your money he or she is in for a 220-volt jolt!

We have seen before the use of high voltage shock clothing like the No-Contact jacket designed for security and other law enforcement personal to give of an electric shock when touched by someone.

Shyam Chaurasia, a resident of Uttar Pradesh’s Varanasi district in India gives another twist to this shocking, wearable design by giving an electrifying slap to pickpockets with his ‘Power-packed Jeans‘ design.

He designed a kit using some thin copper wires concealed as stitches on the back pockets of a pair of jeans, capacitors that collect and store electricity, electromagnetic switches and a 3-volt battery. The circuitry transforms DC power into high voltage AC power (similar to a electronic inverter used in EL T-shirts for example).

To activate the pocket power, flip the switch and the pickpockets will be in for the shock of their life.

Although his design might not be flawless at this point like when the jeans go wet what happens then or you forget to switch off before reaching yourself into the pocket -  I am sure a bit of thinking can make this work without the risk of having a shocking experience.

In any case, the idea is what counts and I find it brilliant, especially when visiting crowded places the risk of pocket snatching is high. The same principle might become also handy when integrated into a handbag, the prime target of pick pockets around the world.

WAb (Wearable Absence) is an interactive garment connecting to a database wireless via a mobile device to enhance the wearers emotional stage with prerecorded memories in audio/visual from.

The WAb garment is fitted with a range of senors that detect heart rate and skin conductivity which allow to calculate the stress or relaxed level, excitement or balanced physical stage.

A database is loaded with audio (music) and visual (photos) content the owner of the WAb garment categorizes to recreate memories associated to different  physical conditions.

Bio sensors send continuously the physical condition of the wearer to the database which returns the associated audio/visual stimulus to the garments integrated speaker and display, recreating memories based on the current physical condition.

We select clothing based not only on functional needs we choose clothing to a high degree out of emotional reasons. Adding additional emotional elements as demonstrated in the WAb design or other memory rich clothing concepts is a logical next step in fashion enabled through  wearable technologies.

Clothing that gives us stimulus based on or changing mood swings and not based on a pre-set time line or play-list has a magical, surprising factor.

WAb is a collaboration project between Barbara Layne, Director of Studio subTela at Hexagram-Concordia in Montreal and Janis Jefferies, Artistic Director of the Digital Studios at Goldsmiths College in London.

[via: Fashioning Technology]

Pretty Smart Textiles is the name of an exhibition about and around the latest innovations in eTextiles from Dutch artists and designers including Daan Roosegaarde, Maartje Dijkstra, Meg Grant, Nicky Assmann, Dorith Sjardijn, Melissa Coleman, Heike Sperber, Marina Venendaal, Karina van Heck, Florian Kräutli, Aduen Darriba, Joachim Rotteveel, Anouk Wipprecht, Charlotte ‘t Hart, Evelyn Lebis, Paula Kassenaar, Paula Segura Meccia and Mark Kwikkers.

Design.nl published a interview with the curators Melissa Coleman and Dorith Sjardijn about the motivation behind the exhibition and their view of the future of smart textiles.

Views and insights regular talk2myShirt reader will be familiar with like the recent trend of illuminated stage wear by artists, usually a field where visual attraction and clothing innovation trends make their first public appearance before catching the high street fashion market.

The interview provides interesting views about the ‘magic factor’ electronics can give to textile and clothing. The fascination of transforming, illuminating, singing textiles from visitors.

A highly recommended ‘must read article’ advice from my side. If you are near or around The Netherlands, maybe you can plan a side trip to the Nutshuis in The Hague. The ‘Pretty Smart Textiles’ exhibition is running until June 24, 2010

The benefits of wearable technologies to add functions to clothing for therapeutic use will are huge. For a starter, integrating monitoring function into clothing without altering the wear comfort enables patients to be more independent from stationary observations.

This in turn reduces the need for hospitals to provide space and personnel who otherwise have to look after, to care for stationary patients.

Too often i hear the argument that such technology enhanced clothing is too expensive when compared to the very simple hospital gowns used today. That is fully correct, but it does not compare apple to apple.

When comparing costs one have to take into account not only the cost of hospital gowns but also the cost a patient will incur for occupying a bed and the care giving costs. Costs that are not directly related to the monitoring function but are costs to serve the purpose of monitoring. Such cost are rather high as anyone can confirm who has had to unfortunate event of staying in a hospital.

Another highly interesting area is the preventive action technology enhanced clothing can provide for people with early symptoms. Better to start at early stage to counter act then to end up one day with costly ‘repair’.

Technology that is seamless and unobtrusive integrated in everyday garment can be use more discrete than very technical looking aids as they are often used today and out of this reason rejected by many.

One such example is the Posture Sensing Shirt. It alerts the wearer of improper posture to help prevent neck, back, and shoulder pain. As many of us spend more time in a chair behind computers it is difficult to maintain a healthy sitting position and most of us ’slouch off’ over time.

The shirt has an electronic sensor attached that detects the increased tension in the shirt’s built-in micro-filaments and vibrates once the posture is not optimal.

Unfortunately this product is not anymore available. A similar design concept we posted about 2 years ago seems did not make it to a commercial product either.

Why do hospital managements and insurance companies not see the whole picture and take the real costs into account when assessing wearable technologies for therapeutic applications?

My fabulous friend Lynne Bruning who organized last weekends eTextile Fashion Show at Maker Faire compensated for my misfortune of not being able to attend this exiting event myself by sending a wealth of information which I am sharing with the talk2myShirt community over the coming days.

For everyone who couldn’t visit this event Alexa Smith, founder of artfuture.com (website will relaunch soon) covered this event on video for our viewing pleasure – thanks Alexa.

To kick off my followup coverage of the eTextile Fashion Show I take the highly interesting observations Lynne collected while she spoke with late teens and early 20-somethings who plan to study, preferably under Leah Buechley, at MIT the topic of eTextiles. Based on such strong interest into this field Lynne rightfully questions: Are there sufficient graduate school positions available for such strong demand? Where are these people going after graduation? Are there sufficient jobs available in the industry? Is the educational interest outweighing the industries interest into this field?

Having myself one foot in the research and development of wearable technologies and the other foot firmly in the industrialization area I am able to have insights into both areas seeing the enthusiasms and expectations at each side but I am also aware of the fear and roadblocks that slow down a larger scale of commercialization.

To my opinion the current status of most wearable technologies and concepts coming from research activities, one-of-a-kind designs by artists and DIY projects are essential for future developments and the introduction of mainstream wearable technologies.

Wearable technology represents  a new, unknown area in terms of manufacturing, marketing, design and most important – consumer experience.

In the past, revolutionary new developments have been made behind walls in engineering departments – top secret – and came only into public view after years of development, testing, trial and error until all stakeholder in a company have been convinced this new technology will have commercial success.

Wearable electronic on the other hand has gone public at a very early, highly experimental stage which triggered an avalanche of imagination not only by technologists and designer but by everyone who touches the topic of wearable electronic.

Wearable electronic has the sound of a magicians spell – it fascinates, it creates high expectations.

We could say the development of wearable technology and in parallel the creation of a business model is completely open and public with it’s positive side of mining the most innovative minds on the planet with the downside of having little coordination among all this activities.

This lack of coordination, of structuring and standardization is a big no-go for the industry which needs strict rules and parameters to produce in a reliable and cost effective way.

One of the biggest gaps I see right now is the link between inventing new, sexy interactive fashion concepts and the production floor. Companies, persons or organizations that carry the concept ideas and demonstrators through a application development cycle to sort out the fit and strong ideas, translating them into manufacturing specifications and designs.

Such application/product building companies would be in great need of people educated into these new type of technologists and designer only … such companies do hardly exist right now.

The call is out to pioneers, venture capitalists and companies that are willing to invest into the commercialization of wearable technologies.

More updates like interviews Alexa made with designers after the eTextile Fashion Show and more in-depth articles about some of the creative people who went on stage with their designs based on the rich update I got from Lynne will come soon – stay tuned to catch the latest news and trends about eTextile developments.

The SmartCap, an invention by Australian-based research organization CRC Mining to detect fatigue of truck drivers working on mining operations, is fitted with hi-tech brain monitoring sensors.

Invented by CRCMining engineer Dr Daniel Bongers, the SmartCap, a baseball cap with integrated EEG (brain waves) sensors that he developed do not need conductive gel but work through hair, determining an individual’s fatigue level.

The brain wave data are recorded and communicated using a wireless Bluetooth link to alert the driver and supervising station.

Fatigue at work, especially during nightshift and among long distance driver is a long standing problem, causing injuries and even deaths every year.

This unique EEG sensor which can be integrated into a cap is the least intrusive form of ensuring that drivers will use this monitoring concept.

A series of test that began in 2008 have shown the reliability and accurate of Dr Daniel Bongers SmartCap development. Further testing is carried out at this moment at the CRCMining operation to solidify the reliability.

The interest into wearable, sensible technologies attract the most innovative minds creating solutions to problems that have been considered as ‘given’ with no real idea how to solve it.

How many times has been the question raised of the usefulness of investigating into wearable technologies. The SmartCap from Dr Daniel Bongers is an excellent example to demonstrate the strength of merging clothing and technology.

[source: ACARP]

A topic that goes one step further than Wearable Electronic: Implantable Electronic. Wearable of course but this new field of electronics g=does not stop on the skin, it goes under the skin.

For me, implantable electronic is as fascinating as wearable electronic as both aim to use cutting edge technologies to improve life quality. Wearable technologies in medical application, although a by far not really explored area, offers clearly demonstrable benefits.

Implantable Electronic in the medical field can be used for monitoring of vital signs like blood test and even could deliver pharmacy directly to the areas needed avoiding the ‘flush out’ treatment usually used today.

Tufts University biomedical engineer Fiorenzo Omenetto uses silk as the basis for implantable optical and electronic devices that could provide a clearer picture of what’s going on inside the body to help monitor chronic diseases or progress after surgery.

Collaborating with Kaplan and materials scientist John Rogers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Omenetto has produced implants that combine silk with flexible silicon electronics.

The group used silk films to hold in place arrays of tiny silicon transistors and LEDs, forming a possible basis for implantable devices. The advantage of the teams invention: it will degrade completely inside the body when the job is done unlike previously developed implants which have to be removed making incisions.

Implantable Electronic seems to be the next frontier, pushing the boundaries of wearable skin deep. A field I will certainly keeping an eye on in future reporting.

[TechnologyReview via GizmoWatch]

The KlimaJack (Climate Jacket) research project, a collaboration between German clothing companies and universities under the lead of ITIV (Institute for Information Processing Technology) aims to create climate controlling wearable systems integrated into clothing.

Sensors integrated into the clothing’s fabric pick up vital body functions which are processed by miniaturized modules integrated in garments.

This research project which started two years ago and will be completed end of Feb 2011 will work out possible solutions for a wireless connection between the different modules.

The consortium wants to develop a technological platform for integration of electronic functions targeted to control and regulate cooling/heating into textiles.

Potential application areas are work wear for personnel exposed to extreme heat or clod environments like rescue workers, first respond teams, military but I could imagine also for some extreme sports wear.

Another interesting area will be the elderly population as the body temperature regulation is degrading with increasing age and these group of people could expect assistance from their clothing in keeping a save body climate even in the scorching summer sun or during chilly winter days.

An interesting project we will keep on monitoring and hope to see some results that can be moved into commercialization in not too distant future.