This topic is not new to the market with Apple teaming up with Levi’s to make its music players more integrated with our body and mind, with the Redwire iPod Jeans.
The most recent i’ve read about is that Apple is patenting a technology which enables solar panels to be put underneath the touch-screens and LCD panels.
Just imagine bring able to stay connected forever when stranded on a desert island. Cool.
But nothing’s cast in stone yet as the surface area would be too small to be able to totally power the device.
That said, let me inroduce some energy-efficient wearable technology clothing of our future with the prospect of having clothing and accessories that change shape, capture solar energy and even provide therapeutic services such as massage and phototherapy.
Di Mainstone’s Skorpions project, kinetic dresses morph and transform in slow, organic motions, and her latest Sharewear collection consists of two modular dresses that link together via magnetic modules to activate lamps that cast dramatic pools of light and shadow.
Angel Chang also works with smart textiles, recently delivering a ruffle-tiered dress whose heat-sensitive fabric, when warmed, reveals a map of Manhattan.
Her hit debut collection featured a range of raincoats that lit up, and she’s been on a roll ever since.
O’Neill’s NavJack ski jacket, which has an LED navigational display as well as audio connections in its hood to direct skiers cross-country.
For those who are bent on leeching off Wi-Fi networks would be pleased to know that ThinkGeek web store offers a Wi-Fi Detector Shirt with glowing bars that change as the strength of the wi-fi signal in your vicinity fluctuates.
Of all, I thought Mathias Gmachl, the director of design and research studio Loop.pH, had the most interesting product for present day.
With partner Rachel Wingfield, Gmachl created the clever, eco-friendly Sonumbra—a parasol by day, offering shelter from the sun, and a streetlight by night, using the solar cells in its canopy to shed light for the surrounding community.
Gmachl also uses this electroluminescent technology in his Light Sleeper, a set of bedding that gently wakes the sleeper in the most natural way, with an alarm set to illuminate the sheets.
No nagging from mother anymore to wake up for work or school! Or that alarm. Gah.
C’N'C’ Costume National’s accessory line, which boasts handbags composed of strips of mini solar panels in contrasting colors.
Along the same lines are Jane Palmer and Marianne Fairbanks’ Noon solar bags. Made from sustainable materials and hand-dyed with organic pigments, the bags have solar panels woven into their sides that can charge cell phones, iPods and other electronic necessities.
Read more here.
I really like the solar bag. i think we will do that too on a t shirt
Technology and clothing. Crazy. I never knew how much was already out there. A wifi detector shirt from ThinkGeek? Crazy. Thanks for the post. I enjoyed reading it.
Charles: Your store is very interesting! Esp. the sound-activated ones. i Love the twin speakers and the traffic lights! Be sure to get your word out when you are done with the solar-panels range! =)) *excited*
Mike: Your site is very informative. I found the post on Retrevo very useful lol…finally something to help me sieve through all those mind-numbing search trees!! AND Ms. Dewey rocks. She knocked on my glass! LOL. nuff’ said – you’re going on my blogroll!
The best information i have found exactly here. Keep going Thank you
I have ideas.