Funded through Kickstarter, the Brooklyn-based industrial design firm The Principals  — with the help of 20 students from the Art Institute of New York —designed and developed the interactive installation Cosmic Quilt. 

Cosmic Quilt is an exploration of how architecture in the near future will  be able to "sense our presence and react accordingly." 

Personally, I'm looking forward to poetically-designed architectural smart environments. 

To experience it in the person, the Cosmic Quilt will be installed at the BONNAROO MUSIC AND ARTS FESTIVAL in Manchester, Tennessee this June 7-10th.

Forster Rohner, a Swiss family run embroidery business for over 100 years, is sewing its way into e-textiles with beautiful, intricately embroidered conductive fabrics.


Using custom embroidery machines, Forster Rohner is capable of creating large production runs of custom e-broidered textiles that can be used as sensors, heating elements, or conductors for electronic components such as LEDs. They have tested and analyzed over 100 different conductive yarns for their properties such as conductivity, washability, and durability.

Embroidered Heating Fabrics and Sensors …

I'm delighted to begin the coverage of the Smart Fabrics conference by highlighting the wonderful talk by fashion technologists and assistant professor in Fashion Design at Kent State , Margarita Benitez.

Ms. Benitez's work lives in the intersection of wearables, smart fabrics and rich media. It is her focus on rich media that offers a paradigm shift in how garments will be made in the near future and the new emerging relationship between designer and consumer.

Ms. Benitez is interested in building community-based online tools for small scale "ready to make" (prêt-à-faire) fashion. 

Along…

Building on the current craze for wearable fitness products, Michele Tittarelli has designed an mp3 player with a gaming bent. The wearable personal trainer/MP3 player shares music with passersby by infecting their playlist with their own music. 

The music virus is determined to be either "good" vs "bad" if its BPM (beats per minute) can help the user achieve his set goal. If a user comes within range of a "good" virus, the two songs are mixed. The current prototype wirelessly transmits data via Xbee to Max/MSP. 

The user can also choose to brush (not accept) the song. 

The wearable Mp3 player comes in three training modes, Fun, Fun+, and Sport, which increase the daily goals of the week.…