23 research outputs found
Giving Body to Digital Fashion Tools
âSuper technology is going to ask for super tactilityâ (Lidewii Edelkoort). Exploring this statement, this chapter reflects on the disconnection between digital fashion tools that lack sensory feedback and the critical role of designersâ embodied experience for their practice. In order to support this discussion, additional literature is brought in, which shows that in dance bodily engagement is crucial for supporting and enhancing the creative process. This is done to explore aspects of mediation and embodiment further, and to propose a research agenda for the investigation of textile experience
How do designers feel textiles?
Studying tactile experience is important and timely, considering how this channel is being harnessed both in terms of human interaction and for technological developments that rely on it to enhance experience of products and services. Research into tactile experience to date is present mostly within the social context, but there are not many studies on the understanding of tactile experience in interaction with objects. In this paper, we use textiles as a case study to investigate how we can get people to talk about this experience, and to understand what may be important to consider when designing technology to support it. We present a qualitative exploratory study using the âElicitation Interviewâ method to obtain a first-person verbal description of experiential processes. We conducted an initial study with 6 experienced professionals from the fashion and textiles area. The analysis revealed that there are two types of touch behaviour in experiencing textiles, active and passive, which happen through âActive handâ, âPassive bodyâ and âActive tool-handâ. They can occur in any order, and with different degrees of importance and frequency in the 3 tactile-based phases of the textile selection process â âSituateâ, âSimulateâ and âStimulateâ â and the interaction has different modes in each. We discuss these themes to inform the design of technology for affective touch in the textile field, but also to explore a methodology to uncover the complexity of affective touch and its various purposes
FabTouch: A Tool to Enable Communication and Design of Tactile and Affective Fabric Experiences
The tactile experience of fabric is not only a sensory experience but also an affective one. Our choice of fabric products, like clothing, is often based on how they feel. Effectively communicating such experiences is crucial for designing tactile fabric experiences. However, there remains a lack of comprehensive understanding of the fabric tactile and affective experiences, preventing the development of tools to facilitate the communication of these experiences. In this paper, we examine the fabric experiences of 27 participants towards nine cotton samples. We combine qualitative and quantitative methods to create FabTouch, a novel tool to facilitate a dialogue in the design of fabric experiences. We found six phases of fabric touch experiences including fabric touch responses, sensory associations, and emotional responses. Initial feedback from designers suggested that FabTouch could enrich design processes both in practice and in education and can create inspiration for physical and digital design explorations
The Compositor Tool: Investigating Consumer Experiences in the Circular Economy
Humanity is living through a crisis that sees our way of life exhausting the resources of the earth and ourselves. The fashion sector shows the negative impacts of conspicuous consumption on our socioenvironmental wellbeing. Despite citizensâ growing awareness of their responsibility within consumption cycles, they reveal concerns about their lack of understanding and the support required for them to become agents of responsible consumption. The Circular Economy flourishes as a conceptual approach to help society transition to a more sustainable existence. This paper explores how emerging creative technology and interaction design might support a shift in the role of citizens in the Circular Economy. We performed a design inquiry that investigated the moment of acquisition via configuration of products, storytelling, and multimodal interaction techniques for the creation of experiences that could catalyse citizen-consumers to become custodians of materials. We developed a retail-based concept toolâThe Compositor Toolâwith which we ran a user study to investigate new experiential ways that consumers can participate in materialsâ circularity. The study highlighted how experience design and new interaction techniques can introduce circularity as part of consumer experience by forging deeper connections between people and products/materials and enabling consumers to have more creative and informative material engagement
Modalities of expression: Capturing embodied knowledge in cooking
When cooking we negotiate between instructions in recipes and personal preferences to make in-the-moment creative decisions. This process represents moments of creativity that utilise and reveal our embodied knowledge. This paper focuses on the capture of expressions of embodied knowledge by digitally-networked utensils. We present a design process investigating the design of tangible interfaces to capture and communicate embodied knowledge as a proposition for recipe authoring tools for open innovation in food. We reflect upon this process to discuss lessons about the individual nature of embodied knowledge and its expression, and the context of capturing it to make design recommendations
Investigating nuanced sensory experiences in textiles selection
In this study, research tools are used to investigate designers' textile selection activities and uncover the sensorial experiences that underpin those activities. Such tools were purposely introduced to disrupt the way designers generally interact with textiles and generate conversations around it. The study was conducted in a textile fair during two consecutive years with an expert audience who were in the mind-set of sourcing. This study resulted in four main themes that reveal the importance of the multisensory experience to textile selection, and the complexity of remembering and communicating such experiences in the design process, given how tacit such experiences are
The future of textiles sourcing: exploring the potential for digital tools
Textile selection involves aspects of objective function and subjective experience. While technical assessments of textiles are extensively supported by standards and machinery that provide the industry with rigorous specifications, the more subjective characteristics remain heavily reliant on designersâ tacit knowledge, experience and intuition. In this paper, we present a study that investigated designersâ textile sourcing activities and if and how digital tools could provide support. The study was conducted in a textile fair with an expert audience in the mind-set of sourcing. An existing digital tool that allows textiles manipulation was introduced to familiarise participants with the digital context and enable conversations on the future of textiles sourcing. We also look at the implications of adopting digital tools for their activities including a transition to more sustainable practices. The results raise awareness of designersâ use of experiential information to support textiles sourcing, besides highlighting requirements for designing future digital tools
FabTouch: A tool to enable communication and design of tactile and affective fabric experiences
The tactile experience of fabric is not only a sensory experience but also an affective one. Our choice of fabric products, like clothing, is often based on how they feel. Effectively communicating such experiences is crucial for designing tactile fabric experiences. However, there remains a lack of comprehensive understanding of the fabric tactile and affective experiences, preventing the development of tools to facilitate the communication of these experiences. In this paper, we examine the fabric experiences of 27 participants towards nine cotton samples. We combine qualitative and quantitative methods to create FabTouch, a novel tool to facilitate a dialogue in the design of fabric experiences. We found six phases of fabric touch experiences including fabric touch responses, sensory associations, and emotional responses. Initial feedback from designers suggested that FabTouch could enrich design processes both in practice and in education and can create inspiration for physical and digital design explorations
Whatever next and close to my selfâThe transparent senses and the âsecond skinâ: implications for the case of depersonalization
In his paper âWhatever next? Predictive brains, situated agents, and the future of cognitive science,â Andy Clark seminally proposed that the brain's job is to predict whatever information is coming ânextâ on the basis of prior inputs and experiences. Perception fundamentally subserves survival and self-preservation in biological agents, such as humans. Survival however crucially depends on rapid and accurate information processing of what is happening in the here and now. Hence, the term ânextâ in Clark's seminal formulation must include not only the temporal dimension (i.e., what is perceived now) but also the spatial dimension (i.e., what is perceived here or next-to-my-body). In this paper, we propose to focus on perceptual experiences that happen ânext,â i.e., close-to-my-body. This is because perceptual processing of proximal sensory inputs has a key impact on the organism's survival. Specifically, we focus on tactile experiences mediated by the skin and what we will call the âextended skinâ or âsecond skin,â that is, immediate objects/materials that envelop closely to our skin, namely, clothes. We propose that the skin and tactile experiences are not a mere border separating the self and world. Rather, they simultaneously and inherently distinguish and connect the bodily self to its environment. Hence, these proximal and pervasive tactile experiences can be viewed as a âtransparent bridgeâ intrinsically relating and facilitating exchanges between the self and the physical and social world. We conclude with potential implications of this observation for the case of Depersonalization Disorder, a condition that makes people feel estranged and detached from their self, body, and the world
Materials biography as a tool for designersâ exploration of bio-based and bio-fabricated materials for the sustainable fashion industry
The fashion industry is highly responsible for critical environmental problems and the sector is increasingly aware of the urgent need to embark on a sustainable transition. Materials, primarily textiles, are particularly problematic for the sectorâs unsustainability, despite the intensive research into alternative solutions that is currently underway. This article presents a comprehensive analysis of these socio-environmental challenges and describes how governments, industry, and designers are seeking to address the situation. Furthermore, it identifies a panorama of alternative bio-based and bio-fabricated materials that could facilitate the transition toward more sustainable fashion. We present a selection of 24 case studies of newly developed bio-based and bio-fabricated materials and group them by their origin. Analysis of the cases led to the delineation of five âmaterials biography categoriesâ to help understand the prominent narratives and to communicate their characteristics and fundamental attributes. This taxonomy also serves to support concepts for a circular economy by helping to build a sort of âmaterial passportâ or âproduct biography,â two concepts underpinning the outcome of this study, and emphasizes the need for tools to further the communication and traceability of these emergent materials. We propose âmaterials biography,â an overarching idea that catalogues essential dimensions and offer it to designers, companies, and final users to enhance their perception and awareness of such novel materials