Skip to content

11. Implications and applications

This week we explored some ideas and possibilities for the final project. I am looking to explore the possibility of more meaningful creating connections to our clothes, ways to keep them longer, and clothing as an interface with the seasons.

Concept

This project aims to form a connection between the body and the environment through a wearable garment that responds to seasonal data. This project will enable the wearer to experience the cyclical nature of the seasons. It encourages the wearer to slow down and observe the slow transformation of the garment throughout the year.

Concept Slide

Background

Growing up on a farm I observed the change in the seasons year after year. Our lives revolved around every drop of rain, planting schedules, and harvest. As a result I formed a connection to the land and the seasons that later turned into a deep respect and care for the land and the environment. This garment will respond to seasonal data by changing shape throughout the year. By mapping the movement of the garment to slow seasonal changes this project contributes to the movement to slow down seasonal fashion cycles by sparking the desire to hold on to the garment for longer.

Design and Fabrication

To execute this idea I plan to create an electronically reconfigurable textile that moves and folds. I plan to use parametric design to create geometric folding patterns that can be worked into a garment. I’ll start the project by creating prototypes of different textile movement samples. I plan to explore the pneumatic forms from the Soft Robotics week and possibly smocking with shape memory alloy (SMA) wire. Next I will design the reconfigurable textiles into a wearable costume.

Design

Data and Control

Next I plan to map the movement of the garment to data that changes slowly with the seasons. Some possibilities for this are temperature, precipitation, snowfall, and the seasonal tilt of the earth. Since I’ll only have a few months to execute this project I will not be able to observe and document it over the course of a year. To make something interesting to present for the final project I will build a demo version from historical data records that can be sped up to observe the changes. The data will be gathered from a place that has some meaning but that has yet to be identified. The movable components of the garment will be controlled with an Arduino or similar microcontroller.

Moodboard

For the aesthetic direction for the project I am inspired by the Solar Punk genre of Science Fiction, which is a positive re-imagining of our collective future. I want to design this for a person who lives in that future -- so this final project is more speculative and definitely a costume. I will incorporate soft colors in a prismatic palette alongside metallic textures to invoke futurism while feeling optimistic.

Moodboard

Timeline

Roadmap

Performance

I would like to wrap up this project by organizing a performance. The garment will be programmed with a demo of what the garment would look like over the course of a year and will be used in a performance. It will be worn by a poet/performer sharing poetry related to the seasons.

Final Project Pitch

Fabricademy Project Pitch by agjarv

References

https://www.kennedy-center.org/
https://designbreakonline.com/tag/origami/
https://styleblog.ca/2016/01/26/chanel-haute-couture-spring-2016-collection/chanel-haute-couture-spring-2016-details-6/
https://www.kobakant.at/DIY/?p=5276
https://news.mit.edu/2021/programmable-fiber-0603
https://tlmagazine.com/the-house-of-lesage-homo-faber-2018/
https://ani-liu.com/mind-in-machine
https://www.weather.gov/dvn/climategraph_year_mli
https://www.noaa.gov/education/resource-collections/climate/changing-seasons
http://www.atmo.arizona.edu/students/courselinks/spring15/atmo336/lectures/sec4/seasons.html
Purtell, Kelly & Instagram Followers. "Ephemerality." May 2020. www.instagram.com/kellypurt


Last update: 2022-01-17