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…pieces of information that interest us

Looking forward, looking Eastward…

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During lockdown the Thread team was fragmented with most of us at home (and communicating digitally) and only physical prototyping tasks taking place at the studio. Now we’re all (except one) back in the studio we can get back to our normal (but precious) face-to-face process of collaboration.

All the physical upheaval and emotional strain of the last 6 months has brought the importance of the overall health of Thread into sharp focus. I was looking for a structure to guide me in this and began researching the concept of Gross National Happiness (GNH) which is used in Bhutan as an alternative measure of a country to Gross Domestic Produce (GDP). I’ve been reading (and getting much inspiration from) “Proposed GNH of Business” by Tshoki Zangmo, Karma Wangdi and Jigme Phuntsho.

What lies beneath…

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…beneath our clothes we have our underwear and mostly we don’t forensically examine it but this is not how Amber Butchart sees it. She is a consultant forensic garment analyst for the UK police. Her background in vintage clothing allows her to date any clothing found with a dead body and she says underwear dates particularly well. Her skill and knowledge in recognising the age, construction and composition of clothing can add vital information in identifying a victim. As Butchart notes, “this has more social value than selling old clothes”. And curiously her methods of helping Crime Scene Officers describe clothing has a wider value. She educates them in the need to see items specifically and fairly; so no ‘ethnic’ used to describe everything from Indian Batik to Ghanain Kente. As she puts it “Describe it….don’t infer interpretation” . This seems pretty sound advice for everday life.

Amber Butchart: Consultant Forensic Garment Analyst

….seashells sum some stiff and some stretch to stay stuck

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Mussels are able to cling on in the face of waves that ought to overwhelm the adhesive strength of the glue that bonds them to the rocks. When the complete system (shell, byssus threads, glue and all) is modelled and analysed it turns out that the combination can withstand forces many times higher that the glue strength predicts. The byssus threads are composed of a combination of stiff and stretchy materials. The integration of rigid and flexible materials yields performance that gives the mussel a competitive edge in turbulent seas. This rings true for us at Thread. We find combining engineering knowledge of rigid materials with textiles skill and experience yields similar results.

Thread: what we do

Just hanging on: Why mussels are so good at it, MIT news office, 23rd July 2013

She spins sea silk by the seashore…..

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It was known to ancient Chinese traders as mermaid silk and mentioned on the Rossetta Stone. Those who weave it swear a Sea oath to never profit from its production and there’s only one weaver of it left in the world: Chiara Vigo (https://www.chiaravigo.it/). Byssus silk is a mind-boggling textile. It’s made from the bundle of filaments that molluscs use to attach themselves to rocks. When collected together these filaments look like spun sugar and are three times finer than human hair. To make 200g of textile requires 300 dives.

Darn and (skin)graft!

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The idea of darning up a missing piece of skin on a human being sounds like the kind of medicine Lewis Caroll and Tim Burton might dream up but it could now be possible in the real world.

Work at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research in Bordeaux showed that “any textile approach is feasible: knitting, braiding, weaving, even crocheting.” Here at Thread we work on many medical products that are in contact with the human body. The properties of textiles are well suited to close contact with the body. They can be flexible, soft, and permeable while providing support and maintaining position. When synthetic threads and scaffolds are used they can trigger an immune response.

Like water off everyone’s back….

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Chloe Ball-Hopkins isn’t like most of us. Where most of us, if we found ourselves miserably soaking wet at a festival because there wasn’t suitable wet weather gear for us, would complain and probably have a hot bath when we got home, she decided to contact fashion retailer Asos to suggest they make the suitable gear. She then collaborated with them and the result is a waterproof jumpsuit that is designed to suit wheelchair and able bodied users alike. The jacket and top can be zipped together/apart so it’s easy to get into and out of or can be worn as a jacket or trousers on its own. It also features a waterproof pocket for medication or a phone.

website link: Asos Collaborates With Paralympian Chloe Ball-Hopkins, Vogue, July 5th 2018

Like water off a duck’s back…

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…but for the rest of us we rely on our waterproof jackets to stay dry in the rain. Unfortunately, it has become increasingly well-known that much of the technology used can accumulate in the environment and in body tissue. A team at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) have developed a waterproofing technology that is both a technical and environmental breakthrough. They started with short-chain polymers (which only bioaccumulate a little but tend to perform worse) rather than long-chain polymers that are typically used (that bioaccumulate a lot but perform better). They then used a process to apply the waterproofing that had been developed at MIT called initiated chemical Vapour Deposition (iCVD). Whereas usually a material is submerged in a liquid waterproofing  that blocks the pores of the fabric thus requiring a further process to open them up again to make a breathable fabric, iCVD doesn’t blog the pores in the first place. the technology is being further developed and the team are looking to license it to outdoor and clothing brands and manufacturers.

website link: MIT Develops Nontoxic Alternative to Water-Repellent Coatings, MIT Press Office, July 2nd 2018

From bin to burns..

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Most of us would rather not consider the possibility of sustaining a serious burn and in that situation the last place we would expect a medical professional to look for a treatment option would be food waste but sometimes the most valuable things are in the oddest places. The skin of the Tilapia fish has been trialed as a dressing for 2nd and 3rd degree burns at the IJF (Institute Doctor José Frota) Hospital in Fortaleza, Brazil. The research was instigated by Marcelo Borges, a plastic surgeon who had spent three decades working on burn wounds. He read an article about the use of Tilapia skin in handcrafted products that mentioned that the other 99% that wasn’t used was a worthless waste product. Human and pig skins are already in use as a treatment in certain burns cases but these specially prepared, sterilised and stored skins are not available in high enough volumes to treat Brazillian burns victims. So Borges decided to investigate if Tilapia skin would be a viable alternative and it turned out in some ways to be superior with twice the amount of collagen type 1 and 3 (important in healing and scarring) and in some cases a single application of Tilapia skin can remain on the patient until scarring and healing occur which removes the painful changing of dressing required with a cream and gauze approach.

 

Jack-Jack doesn’t have any powers..No? Well, he’ll look fabulous anyway

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“I cut it a little roomy for the free movement, the fabric is comfortable for sensitive skin… [a sheet of flame erupts in front of the suit] And it can also withstand a temperature of over 1000 degrees. Completely bulletproof… [four heavy machine guns appear and open fire on the suit, without effect] And machine washable, darling. That’s a new feature.”

 

Thread Loves Edna Mode in The Incredibles.

Nobody’s skin…

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Assuming you’re happy that yeast is definitely not an animal (it’s a fungus….I double-checked) then Zoa is an animal-free alternative to leather. as far as I understand it there’s a bit of DNA cut-and-shut which is re-homed into little yeast cell factorys which grow the Zoa. No animals so no expensive feeding of animals and no expensive and ethically-open-to-discussion killing animals. It’s been in development for years and is finally being tweaked and embodied into products as we speak. Sadly not by us (yet) but we hope to get our hands on some soon. We’re always looking for more materials to add to our library.

Website link: Zoa by Modern Meadow

 

 

Whose skin?

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This morning I was looking at the Pantone website as we want to update our colour reference materials. My eye was caught by their skin matching books which claim to provide “a comprehensive visual reference of human skin tones”. The front cover appears to show a fair range but how they’ve fanned out the sample book seems to reinforce the default of ‘skin’ colour meaning caucasian skin colour. This is an assumption we came across when we worked on prosthesis cosmeses (covers for prosthetic limbs) that have a ‘skin’ colour stocking over the top. It’s interesting to note that truly inclusive design needs to start the second we open our mouths, at the very start of any discussion.

Website link: Prosthesis Cosmesis design: improved realism, longer life

No exaggeration, I think saddle points are amazing..

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I find saddle points (or hyperbolic paraboloids as they’re mathematically known) a deeply pleasing shape. This little hook was developed as part of a large project we’ve been collaborating on. It’s strong and safe as it has no sharp edges.

For more hyperbolic paraboloid and origami joy pop down the rabbit hole that is the website of Erik Demaine

Website link: Erik Demaine

 

Woodn’t it be nice….

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Wouldn’t it be nice to have even natural light in a room regardless of the position of the sun in the sky? One unexpected way to achieve this could be to use wooden panels. Clearly (!) not just an 8′ x 4′ from the builder’s merchant but a new transparent material developed At the University of Maryland. The wood is soaked in a solution to remove the lignin that gives wood its brown colour. Unfortunately removing the lignin also removes its strength and so the material then needs to be treated with epoxy to restore it.

Website link: Wood windows are cooler than glass, University of Maryland, August 16th 2016

Silent language at your fintertips

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This glove may look cumbersome but it could seriously reduce the communication burden for thousands of sign language users. It can translate the 26 letters of ASL (American Sign Language) into text and the current version was built for less that $100 using stretchable and printable electronics that are easily commercially available. The glove has the potential to allow sign language users to travel through everyday situations such as train stations or supermarkets without needing a human translator to communicate their questions or needs.

Website link: Low-Cost Smart Glove Translates American Sign Language Alphabet and Controls Virtual Objects, 12th July 2017, University of California, San Diego

Old skills, new product

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As a child Dr Franz Freudenthal visited indigenous communities in the mountains of Bolivia with his doctor grandmother. On these trips she would quote a snippet of Rudyard Kipling “Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the mountains. Something lost behind the mountains. Lost and waiting for you. Go!” It seems unlikely he could have predicted the importance of the words or the trips. As a paediatric cardiologist he went on to utilise the weaving skills of the indigenous Aymara women to develop an implant to close ‘holes in the heart’.

The device is woven by Aymara women in a clean room environment from a single strand of Nitinol, a nickel-titanium alloy that is superelastic and has shape memory. These material properties allow the woven implant to be compressed inserted into the body via a catheter in the groin and only expanded to its ‘top hat’ form when it is correctly positioned in the heart.

“The most important thing is that we try to get really really simple solutions for complex problems” Dr Franz Freudenthal, Paediatric Cardiologist

Website link: “A new way to heal hearts without surgery”, TED 

Exosuit white blue

Exosuit Launches!

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We are delighted that in March 2019 Exosuit was launched. Exosuit gives athletes proprioceptive feedback to help improve posture, stability and feeling of power. To help make this possible Thread iteratively developed the garment and it’s patented technology with Exosuit. It was tested and refined in conjunction with Progressive Sports in Loughborough and now this amazing technical garment is available to buy.

https://www.exosuit.co.uk/

Cracked egg

Solid state from a fragile source?

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It’s possible that future computers could have memory devices based on eggshells as researchers at the Guizhou Institute of Technology have been prototyping a new form of solid-state memory. Eggshells were processed to form a material that changed its resistance in response to a voltage being applied across it thus making it suitable for use as a ReRAM (resistive random access memory) device. This egg-centric research might offer the possibility of an environmentally friendly, low-cost and sustainable material for the next-generation of non-volatile date storage device.

Website link: “A larger nonvolatile bipolar resistive switching memory behaviour fabricated using eggshells”, Current Applied Physics, Volume 17, Issue 2, February 2017

A playful solution to a serious problem

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A focus on frugality and a willingness to explore unlikely mechanisms has led this team of Stanford bioengineers to develop an incredibly low cost ‘paperfuge’ – a centrifuge made of paper that requires no electricity – as a diagnostic tool to serve the one billion people worldwide who live without infrastructure such as roads and electricity.

Website link: Inspired by a whirligig toy, Stanford bioengineers develop a 20-cent, hand-powered blood centrifuge, 10th January 2017, Stanford University

Merry Christmas 2018!

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Wishing all our clients, suppliers and collaborators a very merry Christmas and a happy new year. We look forward to working together in 2019!

Fungus based leather alternative

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We’re always interested to come across materials that meet particular requirements. In this case a leather alternative that is not an animal product. Muskin is a material based on a large parasitic fungus that grows on trees in subtropical forests. It is similar in appearance to suede-leather and its texture can be stiff like cork or softer.

It reminds me of another unusual textile I’ve written about before here

Website link: MuSkin, LifeMaterials

Bat Bot the aerobatic robot

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I have an ongoing fascination with bats, bat wings and bat flight and so was delighted to come across this bat-based aerobatic robot. It’s known as Bat Bot (B2) and has been developed at the University of Illinois by postdoctural researcher Alireza Ramezani who describes it as being able to “dance in the air with great composure”.

A real bat wing is incredibly complex and contains over forty joints. This allows the morphology of the surface to change rapidly and significantly and enables a real bat to be agile and nimble in the air. Its younger sibling Bat Bot (B2) has a little catching up to do.

Plastic built by food poisoning (sort of)

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Apparently bacteria can be engineered to produce thermoplastics. This is not a fact I knew and is casually mentioned on the website of the BiOrigami team of undergraduates from Standford and Brown universities who are developing a method of producing plastic and then causing it to fold into useful objects based on E.coli bacteria. This is rather different to injection moulding or extruding an object!

The motivation behind the project is to allow tools to be produced in space by astronauts, for example, on flights to Mars, to help reduce the weight of equipment taken.

Website link: BiOrigami Stanford-Brown

A cracking idea

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A big theme in textiles and materials development at the moment is sustainability and recycling so this story about egg packaging made of eggs has scrambled our minds.

Researchers as Tuskegee University added egg shell nanoparticles (350,000 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair) to a plastic polymer consisting of 30% PLA (polylactic acid, a polymer derived from cornstarch) and 70% PBAT (polybutyrate adipate terephthalate, a petroleum polymer that, unlike other oil-based plastic polymers, is designed to begin degrading as soon as three months after it is put into the soil). This resulted in a material that was 700% more flexible than other bioplastic blends and this pliability could make it ideal for use in retail packaging, grocery bags and food containers — including egg cartons.

How amazing to be able to make a valuable material out of a waste product!

Website link: Tuskegee University – Eggshell-based nanoparticles could be used in future biodegradable packaging

Michael Allen Harris mining for jeans

Where once silver was mined, now jeans are

To me, this sounds like the story line from a children’s book, but no, this is something that really happens. Michael Allen Harris and his father-in-law hunt for jeans from the 1800’s in abandoned silver mines. Recently they found a pair of Levi’s from 1873, the year they were first manufactured, that could still be worn. It makes me think of the image on a Levi’s label of two horses trying and failing to pull apart a pair of Levi’s jeans to demonstrate their robustness. They were obviously made to last.

Website link: I mine for 100 year old jeans, The Guardian, 25th September 2015

Video link: Levi Strauss – preserving the past

Hot tap, cold tap

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This morning we were discussing how hot a roomful of 30 people doing tap get in the summer (not a theoretical discussion but a pressing one after a very hot tap class). Another person in the class had a cooling towel which was as cool as if it had been in the fridge. Here at Thread, a casual morning question of ‘how was your evening?’ can quickly descend/ascend into a discussion of evaporative cooling, thermal conduction, absorptive properties of different textiles and potential surface treatments to alter the perceived temperature of a fabric.

The very hungry caterpillar…

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…on saturday he ate through one piece of chocolate cake, one ice-cream cone, one pickle, one slice of swiss chesse, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake, and one sliece of watermelon….and 184mg of supermaket plastic shopping bag.

The Galleria mellonella larva is a very hungry caterpillar indeed.  An amateur beekeeper, Federica Bertocchini, happened upon their amazing digesting and degrading abilities when removing parasitic pests from the honeycombs in her hives. The worms were temporarily kept in a typical plastic shopping bag that became riddled with holes. Bertocchini, from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), collaborated with colleagues Paolo Bombelli and Christopher Howe at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry to show that  “The caterpillars are not just eating the plastic without modifying its chemical make-up. We showed that the polymer chains in polyethylene plastic are actually broken by the wax worms,” said Bombelli.

This discovery might lead to a biotechnological solution to the approximately one trillion palstic bags used each year worldwide.

Website link: Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting biodegradable solution to plastic pollution, 24th April 2017, University of Cambridge 

Prototype animals

We’re in the middle of updating our website and whilst sorting through images (we started with over 6000 – eek) I came across these photos of a prototype bag for a highly technical mechanism we made a few years ago. I seem to remember that after we’d finished it and were examining it to check the quality we decided it looked like the kind of animal you might find in a fossil or at the bottom of the sea. It seemed a shame not to record it and now to share it.

Taking the hard edges off 3D printing

3D printing can seem a magical way to produce an object as if from nowhere. It is often presented as a one stop way to produce a product but what it often lacks is a pleasing or tactile surface finish. Here at Thread we spend alot of time working with textiles and other flexible materials that it’s really exciting to see a 3D printing technique that creates a soft object. Carnegie Mellon University and Disney Research Pittsburgh have developed a new type of 3D printer that uses wool or wool blend yarns to create a felted object.

Website link: Carnegie Mellon University, Press Release, 28th April 2014

Website link: Disney Research

Robot Folding

We spend more time folding fabric than an average person might (particularly at the moment as we’re working on some very large products made of net). It’s a surprisingly subtle skill. We were intrigued to come across Dextrous Blue, a robot developed in a collaborative project between three european universities (Czech Technical University in Prague, Centre for Research and Technology Hellas and University of Glasgow). It can recognise, sort and fold clothes but I think it might have a bit of learning to do before it can help with our tricky, stretchy net fabric.

Website link: CloPeMa – Clothes Perception and Manipulation

Merry Christmas 2017 from Thread!

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2017 has been a great year for Thread – we’ve welcomed two new members to the team! Georgie as a textile prototyper and Elora as a junior designer. Here’s to 2018!

Thai-ing up some loose ends…

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This month we’re back in Thailand, finalising the production set-up for a product launching later this year. We’ve been developing the product with our client for four years and we can’t say much until it’s launched but here’s a photo of a bit of cardboard engineering (while we wait for a component to arrive) helping to feed some binding tape flat into a sewing machine.

Compostable clothing

It’s interesting how frequently a simple idea requires a large amount of perseverance and follows a complicated path before it physically exsists. Clothing that composts is a simple idea to understand but not to enact.

Freitag have spent five years developing three textiles (and their supply chains) to create clothing that bio-degrades in a compost heap (except for the jean button which is reusable).

Website link: Freitag F-ABRIC

BioCouture jacket shoulder detail

Pickled fabric? Not quite, but it is grown in a jar.

Fermenting cellulose
Fermenting cellulose

Designer Suzanne Lee has produced (and continues to develop) a fabric that comes from a zoogleal mat formed during the fermentation of a sweetened tea. The fabric that is produced is still made up of cellulose (like cotton, linen, viscose and rayon) but it comes not from plants but from bacteria. The fabric that is produced has similarities with very thin leather, though sadly it’s performance in the rain is less resilient as it tends to become a little mushy.

It sounds as though the fabric is being developed further so I look forward to seeing its progress.

Website link: Popular Science, BioCouture

Website link: BioCouture

Inuit fishing

Clarence Birdseye

“I do not consider myself a remarkable person. I am just a guy with a very large bump of curiosity” – Clarence Birdseye

Birdseye is synonymous with frozen foods but what I didn’t realise until yesterday was that Clarence Birdeye began developing his fast freeze process after observing how the Inuit preserve their fish through the winter. An innovation based on observing how an expert goes about their work. I like that.

Fast freezing only allows small ice crystals to form so that the cell walls remain intact and the peas (for example) aren’t mushy (different kettle of fish) when defrosted. Clarence Birdseye saw the possibilities of this when he was working on the Canadian peninsula of Labrador. He saw how the Inuit caught fish from ice holes in the winter and then laid the fish on the ice. The combination of the ice underneath and the cold air temperatures (down to -40°C) caused the fish to freeze almost immediately. When this fish was defrosted and eaten it tasted almost as good as when fresh whereas other commercially available fish was frozen over a period of 18 hours and tasted dry and tasteless.

A Singer sewing machine taken back to bits

The pattern pieces that make a sewing machine

In his book, Things come apart, Todd McLellan takes everyday objects, breaks them down into their constituent parts, lays them out and photographs them. These images highlight the hidden complexity of the products around us. Take a sewing machine, for example. We see a smoothly moulded plastic (or on industrial machines a cast steel) shell that hides the numerous mechanisms and components that can take two separate and continuous threads and make a linear connection between two panels, or in simpler terms stitch two things together.

At Thread, we often (well, not that often but probably more than the typical person) talk about how brilliant a sewing machine is and so we particularly liked to see it carefully disassembled. Not so keen on the picture that followed this one of the sewing machine seeming to explode though.

If you look carefullly to the bottom right hand corner of the main shell you can see 12 sewing pins. Pins always get everywhere so I’m not surprised to see that they got inside the sewing machine!

Nike Pro Hijab – a modest improvement

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Great to see Nike have launched a sports Hijab. In 2014 we worked with the pioneering and inspirational Iranian triathlete Shiz Gerami to develop sports clothing that met the Iranian ministry of sport’s modesty requirements, but did not impact on Shiz’s performance in the World triathlon championships. We were delighted to work with her to remove barriers for female athletes who wish to be modestly dressed while exercising. Statistics from Sport England show that just 18% of Muslim women take part in regular sport, compared to 30% of the total female population.

Website link: Shiz Gerami interview, Triathlete magazine, January 19th 2017

Website link: Nike unveils Pro Hijab for female Muslim athletes, Dezeen, March 8th 2017

Shirin Gerami WTS Edmonton

Silver nano wire

Just like our Mums always said….

…turn the heating down and put another jumper on, except that now that extra jumper might be dip-coated in a silver nanowire solution that makes the fabric highly radiation insulating. It could even reflect back over 90% of a user’s body heat whereas the average item of clothing reflects around 20%. At the Yi Cui lab at Stanford University fabrics have been created that have silver nanowires embedded in them to reflect human body infrared radiation while maintaining the original breathability of the fabric. This doesn’t get around the problem of persuading someone to put a jumper on in the first place though….

Website link: Personal Thermal Management by Metallic Nanowire-Coated Textile, Nano Letters, 2014

Make-up that makes things happen

Katia Vega seems to work at the intersection of the functional and the fabulous. It would be easy to think that technology research involving make-up would be perhaps a little frivolous but the miniaturisaton required alone is enough to refute that idea fairly thoroughly. She has created chemically metalised eyelashes and conductive eyeliner that transform a blink into a command and also RFID false nails that have the potential to unlock doors, act as tickets, pay for items or even allow a DJ to use the surface of water to mix tracks. Seriously powerful make-up.

Website link: Katia Vega, Beauty Tech Designer and a PostDoc Researcher at PUC-Rio

Knitting as the first additive manufacturing

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Interesting to chat to Hal Watts from Unmade at a reception for The 1851 Commission (an amazing organisation who funded both Hal and me to study at the RCA) about knitting as the earliest form of Additive Manufacture. In knitting you take a continuous material to form an object without waste and without removing excess – sounds like additive manufacture, no?

Website link: Unmade

Website link: The Royal Commission for the Great Exhbition of 1851

Not quite as convenient as an invisibility cloak…

Researchers at the University of Rochester have developed a cloaking device that uses standard lenses and optical equipment rather than exotic materials. It works across a range of distances and angles and avoids distortion of the background which often reveals that cloaking is being attempted.

It may not be quite Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak (it doesn’t flow elegantly and smoothly) but’s it’s an interesting development and a good example of standard components being used to create an unusual device.

Website link: ‘Cloaking’ device uses ordinary lenses to hide objects across range of angles, University of Rochester, Newscenter, 25th September 2014

Warwick glove small

Cheap and cheering 3D printed electronic sensors

Researchers at the University of Warwick have developed a low-cost conductive plastic composite that can be 3D printed using a standard 3D printer. This opens up possibilities for printing electronically functional objects rather than just beautiful models that have no functionality. Currently they have produced a partial glove that allows for the movement of a hand to be tracked and slightly more comically a mug with embedded sensors that can detect how full it is.

Website link: University of Warwick – Engineers pave the way towards 3D printing of personal electronics

Website link: Research article – A Simple, Low-Cost Conductive Composite Material for 3D Printing of Electronic Sensors

Spiderman’s secret?

The Gecko’s ability to climb walls and ceilings captures the imagination of many design and engineering students (it certainly did when I was studying) but most get no further than daydreaming about using this impressive skill at human scale. It’s the scaling up that’s prevented most people from getting anywhere with it. Not Elliot Hawkes though. The mechanical engineering graduate student has made his spiderman dreams come true and scaled the glass walls of one of the buildings on the Stanford campus using Gecko pads on his hands and feet. The trick to scaling up is to distribute the force equally across the pads and use minimal energy to switch the pads ‘on’ and ‘off’. Further details on how they achieved this on the Standford News page below.

Website link: Stanford News – Stanford engineers climb walls using gecko-inspired climbing device, 21st November 2014

baby product design

Baby product design for time-strapped parents – Bibado

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Baby product design, BibadoHow can baby product design save parents time? Reduced mess = less tidying.

Rachel and Tom Wood are parents of twins – and time sapped as a result. Seeking to save on tidying and clothes changes (or messy kids) after mealtimes, Rachel began experimenting with bibs. They approached Thread with a prototype made from a broken umbrella that strapped onto highchair trays, because they wanted to turn their functional lash-up into a product.

Thread explored design options and prototyped them for user testing. We developed the chosen concept further to be made from a single pattern piece that was adjustable to increase the age range of the product, and could fit a wide range of high chairs.

This bib catches mess that would otherwise end up on clothes and the floor. We can vouch for it as Thread’s directors tested a pre-production prototype with their first child.

We’re delighted that Bibado has launched this week and is available to buy.

prototype gloves concept

Go Gloves and Wheelchair Prototype

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Thread has recently reconnected with Ben Hubert of Layer, a friend from previous projects. Ben has been working with Materialise on a 3d printed wheelchair. Here are some links to the very good-looking wheelchair and glove prototypes.

We’ve previously worked with Ben back in our earliest days when we were involved with the design and prototyping of the soft parts of the Mamas and Papas Mylo pushchair.

GO-home-page-0221

Website link: Go wheelchair

Website link: Go gloves

(left) KONE Ultrarope in lift hoisting machine and (right) KONE Ultrarope next to standard twisted steel lift cables

Where bikes lead, lift cables follow?

For a long time all bikes were made of steel, then came aluminium and then carbon fibre. For fairly similar reasons (improved strength per unit weight) KONE have developed the Ultrarope (TM) lift cables based on a carbon fibre core. The limiting factor for the length of current lifts is the strength to weight ratio of steel that the cables are made of. At a certain length the weight of the steel is greater than the steel itself can withstand. This currently limits lifts to around 500m tall. Hope the ride quality is more comfortable than a carbon fibre bike!

Website link: “The other mile-high club”, The Economist, 15th June 2013

Website link: KONE Ultrarope (TM), press release, 10th June 2013

No really, this is the new black

I still remember being a child and my Grandad telling me that black was the absence of all light. It was an astonishing thought as I couldn’t fathom how it could be absence if I could see it.

A new material developed by Surrey NanoSystems reminded me of this.

Watch the video and be astonished when the sample is turned over to show the backing and then turned back to show the black front face again. It’s nice to have a dash of childlike wonder on a Monday afternoon.

Website link: Surrey NanoSystems – British breakthrough in worlds darkest material launched at Farnborough International

The future of textiles R&D in the UK

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Thread attended a consultation workshop for the UK textile community exploring textile R & D priorities for 2017-2020 organised by the Knowledge Transfer Network.

One of the main themes was development of textiles that can integrate with data gathering equipment for monitoring purposes eg medical.

Another strong theme was creating textiles that can be recycled easily without decreasing the value of the final textile. Increasing use of laminates in textiles (where several layers with different properties are combined to create a technical textile) can make this more difficult.

Website link: Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN)

 

 

The wrong trousers went into space in 1971!

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Inspiration can come from many places and often seems to come from seemingly unrelated fields. I was recently at the Science Museum’s Cosmonauts exhibition and found the clothing particularly fascinating. (Frustratingly for me there was almost no information on what the garments were made of or how they were constructed. I wish I could have opened the cabinets to have a closer look) One item in particular caught my eye and I couldn’t help but wonder if Nick Parks of Aardman Animations might also once have seen them?

Website link: Chibis Lower Body Negative Pressure (LBNP) Device, NASA

Website link: Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age, The Science Museum, 18th September 2015 – 13th March 2016

 

Body-Armour Defense Prototyping

MOD unveils futuristic uniform design

Great to see a project we contributed to being launched.

We worked with Kinneir Dufort to develop the body armour prototypes and produced the final prototype shown in the video in house at Thread.

Website link: MOD unveils futuristic uniform design, 16th September 2015

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Not where you might expect to see inclusive design…

“Innovation and inspiration at Nike often start with the simple act of listening to the voice of the athlete. As expressed within its mission statement, the company believes: If you have a body, you’re an athlete”

We have a little phrase we sometimes uses at Thread: “Extreme to mainstream” that is, to look to those with extreme needs to get inspiration for something that the mainstream will desire. Great to see something similar happenning at Nike. I can’t see the FLYEASE on the UK store yet but I hope the concept is here to stay.

Tiny jumper

Did I shrink my jumper?

Here at Thread, we relish visits to manufacturers (we’ve even been known to visit factories when we’re on holiday).

Recently we’ve been looking into seamless knitting for a few projects. It’s an intriguing manufacturing process as the properties of a garment (such as stretch or ventilation) can be varied in different parts of the garment without using a second material. This removes seams between panels which can make tight-fitting garments more comfortable. It’s also able to create small-scale details (hence the mouse jumper in the picture).

 

EPSRC centre for innovative manufacturing in industrial sustainability: fourth annual conference

Hose drying
Before

Tooley Tote
After

An interesting conference in Cambridge with several thought-provoking talks.

Kresse (of Elvis & Kresse) was particularly inspirational and challenging. I saw her speak when the company was just starting out and fell in love with the reclaimed firehose material. It’s an amazing story of rescuing an incredibly high quality material and repurposing it to extend its usable life. I like that the company ethos is to reduce waste and in doing so they have quietly attracted the attention of the fashion world.

Edgar Martins - Astronaut Dressing Room

What happens to spacesuits when they’re not being used?

In 2011, Edgar Martin spent 9 days exploring the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre in star City, Moscow as part of a project to record the work of a space programme from an artistic point of view. This particular project stemmed from a childhood fascination with spacesuits, in particular, what happenned to them when they’re not in use. After many days of being taken around the standard tourist and journalist sights he finally found the room where the suits were stored “It was like christmas and I was 10 again.”

Here at Thread we understand that feeling; one dream project that has been mooted is to work on spacesuits. The technical precision and robustness of design must be extraordinarily high. We like a challenge though.

Website link: Edgar Martin’s best photograph, The Guardian, 11th December 2013

Website link: Edgar Martin: The Rehearsal of Space & the Poetic Impossibility to Manage the Infinite, 2014

Ancient bone body armour found in Siberia

A complete set of body armour made of bones has been discovered in Omsk, Siberia and according to Yury Gerasimov, a research fellow of the Omsk branch of the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, it would have “given good protection from weapons that were used at the time – bone and stone arrowheads, bronze knives, spears tipped with bronze, and bronze axes.” Bones are naturally well-suited to resisting blunt trauma as they are not a single solid material but made up of two distinct types of tissue: the compact bone tissue that makes up the smooth outer surface and the trabecular bone tissue of the interior which is made up of rod and plate like elements. These two structures would dissipate energy under impact therefore helping to protect the person underneath. We’ve worked on the human factors side of body armour and it’s amazing how ancent body armour can provide inspiration for modern concepts.

Website link: Warrior’s 3,900 year old suit of bone armour unearthed in Omsk, Siberian Times, 6th September 2014

Marks and Spencer Autograph shwop coat

A shoddy coat from M&S? Well, yes and no.

Really interested to see the M&S ‘shwop’ coat. Firstly, it’s great that clothes that are unsuitable for charity shops or reuse can still have value. Secondly, it reduces costs. Lastly, I find the rebranding of what is actually a fairly old idea quite funny. The process of shredding unwanted woolen garments (or using waste from wool production) to produce a recycled wool yarn creates shoddy wool. This is why many woolen garments are labelled ‘pure new wool’ or ‘virgin wool’. The shoddy wool retains many of the excellent properties of new wool but as the fibres are shorter it can become a coarser and stiffer fabric. This can be overcome by mixing other fibres to improve the feel. Perhaps the word shoddy might eventually stand for not wasting things rather than being of questionable quality?

Website link: M&S stories – sustainable fashion, the shwop coat

The future of India’s textile industry

India has a long history of textile skill in development and production. This is reflected in the number of words we have in English that derive from Indian languages including calico, gingham, khaki, seersucker and chintz. The technique of mordant dyeing (that uses natural dyes to gives intense colours that don’t fade) was used in India from 2-3 thousand years ago. Until the 18th century Europe was less skilled than India in textile production. With the industrial revolution there was and has continued to be huge development in Europe but recent research suggests that India may be about to increase its share of the technical textiles world market share.

There are difficulties as many of the raws ingredients have to be imported (which increases the cost) and power supplies can be unreliable. However the Indian government is actively supporting the technical textiles industry and the sector is expected to grow by around 20% annually to reach a value of £16.25 billion by 2016-2017.

Website link: Technical Textile Market in India 2012-2016, August 2013

M.C. Escher drawings become a little closer to being possible?

The idea of water flowing uphill seems impossible and confined to fantastical images like those created by the artist M.C. Escher (Website link: M.C. Escher, Waterfall). However, engineers at MIT have made this impossibility feasible. Inspiration was taken from motile cilia, the small hair-like structures that line the human throat and waft particles and fluids away and out of the respiratory passages. Each microhair is about 70 microns high and 25 microns wide (a quarter of the size of a human hair) and made of Nickel. An array of these microhairs was fabricated onto an elastic, transparent layer of silicone allowing for it to be applied to many surfaces. The behaviour of the microhairs can also direct the flow of light and so in a similar way to a venitian blind can provide shading.

Website link: MIT news, Press Release, 6th August 2014

Screws made of baked silk for pinning broken bones

The spiders have the answer

Silk is an extraordinary material with several amazing properties. It can provide excellent ballistic protection and has been used extensively in the past and perhaps slightly more surprsingly is part of the current issue of kit for British soldiers. Here at Thread we know that silk (both silkworm and spider) can do these suprising things and yet we were still impressed to hear of screws for pinning broken bones being made of silk. The screws are created by moulding and baking a silk fibroin (an insoluble protein created by spiders) material. These screws are self-tapping and reduce stress shielding (where pins and implants can reduce the stress on a bone which can in turn reduce its density and strength) and promote bone remodelling.

Website link: The use of silk-based devices for fracture fixation, Nature Communications, 4th March 2014

Textiles in Matisse's paintings

Matisse and textiles as portable inspiration

I just came across this interesting article about an exhibition in 2005 of the textiles that (it’s claimed) inspired Matisse’s use of colour. In the town where he grew up there was no museum or galleries but the amazingly vividly coloured textiles were produced. Throughout his lifetime Matisse collected and carried around with him a selection of glorious fabrics that he used as backdrops and inspiration in his paintings. This seems to me to sum up some of the benefits of textiles; that they are lightweight and easy to pack-up and transport and can carry a huge array of colour and pattern with subtle variations that, say, a moulded plastic could never equal.

Website link: Matisse’s debt to textiles revealed, Guardian, 2nd March 2005

19th century digital

Jacquard punchcards
Jacquard punchcards

Jacquard weaving is a development of traditional loom weaving that integrates a system of punched cards (see above) that can control the position of the warp (lengthways threads) and therefore what colour and pattern is visible on the surface of the fabric. These punchcards automate what appears to be a complex process into a simple, repetitive one. This formed the basis of punch card data storage systems, notably Herman Hollerith’s machines and company that went on to become the core of IBM. It’s a curious thought that the roots of all the electronic, digital systems in use today were in the creation of patterned textiles. It seems to me this shows that it’s hard to predict where a technical innovation might eventually lead.

The Jacquard loom could use this simple system to produce images of incredible complexity. The portrait to the left was produced on a Jacquard loom using black and white silk which makes it a very early digital image. The automation of the pattern creation significantly reduced the cost of creating woven patterns and therefore made them available to far more people.

This excellent video on the V&A website illustrates clearly how Jacquard weaving can create complex patterns.

Website link: a video of how Jacquard weaving works, V&A museum

Shirin Gerami WTS Edmonton

Shirin Gerami: Iran’s first female triathlete

Shirin Gerami crosses the line at WTS Edmonton as Iran’s first and only female triathlete!

Thread and Shirin worked together to make the specialised kit that had to provide complete coverage with minimal effect on mobility and thermal burden. In a world of minimal, one-piece figure-hugging kit this seemed a tall order, but this was achieved with thoughtful design and selection of the coolest possible materials.

“They were comfortable, they looked awesome, they were easy to bike and run in and at no point in time did I wish I had a layer less.”

In a very short time window we were able to create toiles, produce artwork, source print and construct the final race kit. Shirin campaigned tirelessly for permission to race, which was finally granted the morning of the event.

Website link: Shirin’s blog for 220 Triathlon magazine

Website link: ITU World Triathlon Grand Final Edmonton 2014

insect gears

Not where you might expect to find gears


Researchers at the University of Cambridge have that a small plant-hopping insect, the Issus, has hind leg joints that very closely resemble mechanical gears like those in a car gearbox. These gears ensure that the Issus’ hind legs move with precise synchronisty when it starts to jump. In fact greater synchronicity than if the legs were controlled by neural signals alone. As Malcolm Burrows from the University of Cambridge says ‘In Issus, the skeleton is used to solve a complex problem that the brain and nervous system can’t.’ This is a really interesting example of a mechanical solution to what appears to be a nervous system issue. It reminds me of the origins of computing in Jacquard weaving….

Website link: “Functioning ‘mechanical gears’ seen in nature for the first time”, 12th September 2013

#showmeyourpump

Insulin pumps and beauty pageants

Insulin pumps and beauty pageants: one a fairly frequent topic of discussion at Thread the other less so but Miss Idaho 2014 caught our attention. Sierra Sandison has type 1 diabetes and rather than hide her insulin pump she simply wore it on the waistband of her bikini. We were very happy to see this as for the last few years we’ve been involved in developing and prototyping pouches for insulin pumps for a major medical equipment brand. Where previously the only option for a pouch was black (always black), plain and generic there is now effort to create pouches that fit in with people’s lives and wardrobes.

Website link: #showmeyourpump takes off as diabetics inspired by beauty queen post proud pictures of their insulin pumps, The Independent, 19th July 2014

MIPS helmet technology

When I was on honeymoon in New Zealand a few years ago we gatecrashed (politely asked if we could join in) a symposium at the University of Otago entitled “Technologies in Sport: Performance, Bodies and Ethics”. Probably not most people’s idea of a good use of honeymoon but luckily my spouse is as much of a geek as me. One of the most striking things I learnt was about brain injuries, particularly in boxers, from Dr Andrew Pipe (now at the University of Ottawa and previously involved with the inception of WADA – World anti-Doping Agency) who told me that some of the most dangerous brain injuries are rotational rather than direct ie. a glancing blow to the side of the head that spins it rather than a straight on impact. These rotational forces cause shear forces in the brain which can be extremely dangerous. I’ve had this in the back of my mind since then (especially when skiing and biking) and so this helmet technology from Swedish company MIPS caught my attention. It seems that the basic principle is to dissipate rotational forces by having a low-friction layer between the outer shell and inner of the helmet. This mechanism imitates the brain’s own means of protecting itself ie the cerebrospinal fluid that surrounds the brain and is itself a low-friction layer between the brain and the skull. A neat bit of biomimicry.

The finite element model of a human head to the left shows the strain in the brain when wearing a helmet with MIPS technology on the right and a standard helmet on the left. The more red in the image the higher the strain in the brain and the higher the chance of injury to the brain.

Website link: MIPS – How it works

TacSat Razor Antenna, Selex ES

TacSat Razor Antenna

Thread developed and prototyped the carry bag of the TacSat Razor Antenna during development. The mechanism that deploys the antenna is wonderful (it delighted us geeks here at Thread) and the tight tolerances on the mechanism meant the bag had to be extremely tightly toleranced too. This sounds simple but ‘hard’ prototypers talk about tolerances of +/- 0.1mm whereas textiles tend to be on more of a +/- 5mm tolerance scale. A tricky interface!

Website link: Selex ES, Press Release, 7th May 2014

Website link: TacSat Razor deployment demonstration

HMS Argus painted with dazzle camouflage

Hiding in plain sight

In a recent meeting there was a discussion about obscuring the outline of an object or body which reminded me of this early and bold camouflage. There was no science behind it when it was created just a feeling that it might make things more difficult. Recent research at the University of Bristol has shown that for large, slow-moving boats it is ineffective but for faster moving vehicles, such as a land-based car or truck, it may well provide an advantage. A surprising way to make something more difficult to discern.

Website link: That old razzle dazzle, The Economist, June 7th 2011

Website link: Camouflage, detection and identification of moving targets,Proceedings of the Royal Society B – Biological Sciences, vol 280.

A fabric-covered wing being made during WW1

Wind turbine blades covered in fabric? A modern technology that sounds like an old one.

With increasing demand for sustainable alternatives so it makes sense to minimise the weight of the sustainable energy production system so that it’s easier to deliver and uses less fossil fuel to do so! GE are developing a woven fabric that is based on fibreglass and will be tough and flexible. It will be tensioned over a steel frame and could be assembled on site rather that requiring expensive fibreglass lay-up moulds and avoiding the need to transport a blade that is 10’s of metres long.

Its interesting that technological developments can often seem cyclical, fabric covered wing structures were used in the first aeroplanes as it created a lightweight, relatively rigid structure and now that concept is being reused and updated with tecnical textiles.

Website link: GE Reports: “Can you knit a wind turbine?”, 3rd December 2012

Mamascent – brings Mama’s scent to baby’s bottle

Mamascent

Mamascent™ is a bottle attachment that recreates the sensory benefits of breastfeeding for bottle-fed babies. It consists of a pad that becomes infused with the smell of the mother. A petal from the pad can be attached to a bottle to calm and comfort baby during bottle feeding.

Thread designed and developed the injection moulded clip that fits around the bottle teat (and under the lid) and the distinctive flower-shaped pad as well as sourcing manufacturers for both.

Harry & Jack Jet pack

5-4-3-2-1-Jet Pack is launched!

It’s always pleasing when a product we’ve worked on reaches the market. Thread undertook Design for Manufacture refinement and manufacturing samples for Harry & Jack’s. This is a product that brought a smile to our faces. I think we’re probably all too old and big to have a jet pack rucksack now though…….aren’t we?

Website link: Harry & Jack’s – Adventure Packs™

From stretchy bat wings to stretchy batteries

Researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Illinois have developed a lithium-ion battery that can be stretched to 300% of its original size and still function. Not quite as good as a bat wing (see below) but when compared to a standard, solid battery rather extraordinary. One suggested use is for implantation into the body where flat, rigid batteries would not be suitable.

Website link: Northwestern University elastic lithium-ion battery

Brilliant bat wings

Having started thinking about the BMW GINA car the photo of it with its door open started me thinking about bat wings and flight.

There are several brilliant things about bat wings and flight. When a bat is flying it folds its wing on the upstroke which can generate up to 50% more lift. Also, the skin of its wing can stretch by 400% without breaking.

Website link: Brown University robotic bat wing

(left) Blowfly eggs on a moulded zip and (right) a standard coil zip

An unexpected context for a discussion about zip quality

It’s not often there’s an overlap between textile product design and forensic science, but research undertaken by Poulomi Bhadra (an MSc student at King’s College, London) in conjunction with the Metropolitan Police and the Natural History Museum seems to have found one. The research project, “Factors influencing accessibility of bodies to blowflies”, looked at the rate of decompostion of (in this case pigs) relative to differences in the zips on bags and suitcases. This included the quality of manufacture of the zip! Cheaper moulded zips tend not to be made to the tightest tolerances so the teeth do not fit exactly together. (More importantly to Thread cheap zips don’t run as smoothly and occasionally the teeth break.) Coil zips were found to be better at keeping out blowflies which is slightly surprising as most waterproof and airtight zips are moulded.

Website link: Metropolitan Police, “Insects hold key to forensic advances”, 8th August 2013

Leckey Leeway pelvic harness Design Healthcare Medical

Leckey Leeway launched!

The Leckey Leeway pelvic cradle (that Thread helped Leckey to develop) has just been launched. It provides improved postural support and proprioceptive feedback for wheelchair users. The improved hip position can improve upper body posture and position which in turn can improve breathing, head carriage and even appetite! The product developed from the insight that a windsurfing harness keeps the hips in a good position and improves proprioception. A great example of looking at one atypical situation (we’re not all windsurfers!) for inspiration in another atypical situation.

Website link: Leckey Leeway, pelvic harness

Featherweight feet

3D knitted spikes by Nike

The upper of the Nike Flyknit is like no other trainer or spike. Instead of being created from a number of panels stitched together it is knitted as a single piece (including the tongue). The upper has different properties in different areas. This allows the upper to be supportive where needed whilst also being breathable and incredibly light. At 110g it weighs roughly half of what a standard pair of spikes would. As an athlete (realistically an ex-athlete but I haven’t quite hung up my spikes), this sounds incredible. The lighter the shoe, the less energy you waste by making your feet heavier. Also, the more connected you feel to the ground which can help to improve running technique. The manufacturing engineer in me is intrigued by the 3D knitting process that came out of 4 years of R&D and required new machines to be developed. Perhaps understandably Nike don’t seem to have made public much technical detail of how these magical knitting machines work. That’s one factory I would love to have a good look around!

Website link: Nike Flyknit performance track spike

A very small section of techtextil 2013

techtextil 2013 – international tradefair for technical textiles and non-wovens

We’ve just returned from the techtextil tradefair in Frankfurt. Technical textiles and non-wovens as far as the eye could see! Some interesting new materials and some great new suppliers. Lots of development happening in the integration of leds into textiles. I think we’re still a way off it being a mainstream technology though (it’s those pesky batteries that are needed). Now to sort through all the samples, business cards and brochures!

Website link: techtextil

BMW Gina

A fabric-covered car

The BMW GINA concept car was made a few years ago but I started thinking about it the other day. It’s such a different way of thinking of a car. I like the idea of questioning the obvious: in this case, the assumption that safety comes from a big hard shell.

Website link: BMW GINA concept car video

Keira with Anna and floral leg

Is it a prosthetic limb or is it a work of art?

Just finished a quote for some potential work on prosthetic limbs (which we’re very excited about). We came across this amazing organisation during a bit of background research. The Alternative Limb Project creates prosthetic limbs for individuals, either ones that are so realistic it’s disconcerting in a ‘why isn’t that attached to a person?’ kind of a way or incredible limbs that are definitely not designed to match a typical limb. It seems strange to be thinking of a prosthetic limb as a fashion accessory but this one surely must be?

“My attitude to being an amputee and wearing an artificial limb has changed with time. To begin with one is very aware of being different, of being disfigured, but as time moves on one adjusts and changes perspective. In the first few years my focus was on trying to be normal, wearing clothes that hid the fact that I was an amputee, but over the years I have become more comfortable with who I am and I now embrace having different legs for different activities and different occasions”
Kiera Roche, Chairperson for Limb Power

Website link: The Alternative Limb Project

Website link: Limb Power – life after limb loss

Rock making!

A vintage video of how to make rock!

This video from 1957 of a rock making factory in London is astonishing. The letters in rock seemed magical enough anyway but now they seem even more extraordinary. Sometimes things are made in the most unexpectedly simple way. In the case of rock, a bit of scaling makes it all work perfectly: build really big letters and then stretch them until they’re small. (I also think the voiceover and background music adds a little extra charm.)

Website link: British Pathé video clip archive

Iris Van Herpen and Materialise 3D printed dress

The end of the seam? 3D printed garments on the catwalk at Paris Fashion Week S/S 2013

A series of garments were shown in Iris Van Herpen’s collection at Paris Fashion Week S/S 2013 that were 3D printed in a single piece using Materialse’s Mammoth Sterolithography machines. As they are created in a single piece they have no seam lines. This has an especially beautiful effect as the ‘fabric’ they have created has a lace-like structure that is able to run down from the shoulders and under the arm in a continuous pattern rather than having break lines where the panels of the dress would usually be stitched together. The shape and form of most tailored garments from suits to waterproof jackets for skiing, climbing etc are created through the positioning of seams and darts and the seam itself can change the proprties of the material at that point (eg. making it stiffer and less flexible). If the garment is created in a single piece it breaks the link between material property and shape. This sounds like it has potential for more function driven applications such as postural support garments and protective clothing where the item has to have certain properties (eg stiffness, stretch or permeability) but the fit and comfort of the garment is paramount to its overall success.

Website link: Materialise – large scale 3D printed of total garments

Website link: Iris Van Herpen – Voltage haute couture collection

Patagonia R4 wetsuit

A wool-lined wetsuit? I kid you not

standard vs merino vs synthetic cropped

Here at Thread we love natural fibres, particularly Merino wool, so it’s brilliant to see it being used by Patagonia to line their frigid water wetsuit. The fibres of Merino wool are much smaller and smoother than most other wools so it can be worn next to the skin without being itchy. The image above shows standard wool on the left, Merino wool in the middle and a synthetic fibre on the right. The merino is as fine as the synthetic but has all the marvellous properties of wool; such as not smelling after you sweat in it and being warm when it’s wet (due to water getting trapped inside the fibre itself and providing extra insulation) unlike synthetics.

Patagonia have blended it with polyester to improve its durability (and probably reduce cost and make a more predictable fabric). The Merino lining means that thinner Neoprene can be used for the same level of insulation. Here’s to happy warm surfing in the winter!

Website link: Patagonia R4 wetsuit

Cork bowl

An intriguing cork material

This bowl is made of 100% cork but processed in such a way that it apparently feels more similar to leather and is very pliable. This seems like it could be useful for something less decorative and more function-led. Cork provides excellent insulation (I think I’ve heard that is was used on the early Russian spacecraft) and protection from impact. It says it’s 100% cork but I wonder if there are any adhesives, resins etc used to bind it together? It seems there probably are so not quite 100% cork…

Website link: how cork is made

Website link: Adjust-a-bowl at Branch, sustainable design for living

How to make a bra…

It is both surprising and perhaps obvious that the process of making a bra is complex, careful and time consuming. A good bra has high requirements; to be lightweight, structurally robust and tailored to fit a variety of breast shapes. On top of that, it should look good.

RoboJelly: hydrogen fuel powered biomimetic jellyfish

Researchers at the Bio-Inspired Materials and Devices Laboratory at Virginia Tech have developed and are testing a hydrogen fuel powered robotic jellyfish. The jellyfish consists of a silicone bell structure with nano-platinum catalyst-coated multi-wall carbon nanotube (MWCNT) sheets, wrapped on the surface of nickel–titanium (NiTi) shape memory alloy. As a mixture of oxygen and hydrogen gases makes contact with the platinum, the resulting exothermic reaction activates the nickel–titanium (NiTi)-based shape memory alloy which flexes thus causing the jellyfish to propel itself.

Website link: Smart Materials and Structures: Hydrogen-fuel-powered bell segments of biomimetic jellyfish (article abstract)

Website link: Virginia Tech: Bio-Inspired Materials and Devices Laboratory – Alex Villanueva

Dress-up: digital pattern-cutting from a physical mannequin

The Igarashi Design Interface Project at the Japan Science and Technology Agency is developing software that allows the user to draw in physical space on a mannequin to generate digital patterns that can be manipulated in software. There are a few basic tools for creating sweeps of fabric, cut-outs and seam lines. I can see this being really useful for other fabric products like personal protective equipment (where fit and so ergonomics are vital), pushchair hoods (which can be made up of sveral compound curves in 3-D – not easy to model in 3-D software alone) etc. I hope this is developed further…and soon.

Wrecking crew orchestra – electroluminescent-suited stop motion dancers

Wrecking crew orchestra is made up of eight Japanese men who perform dance routines wearing electroluminescent suits. You might expect the result to be bad, inane, cheesy or all three but the choreography makes it a delight. Makes me think of the type of Japanese theatre (Bunraku?) where the pupeteers wear black to blend in to the background

Website link: iLuminate: wearable, wireless lighting system

Kranium with shell

An alternative cylcle helmet 2…Kranium – a head protector made of cardboard

Kranium is made of ribs of corrugated cardboard that are slotted together into an array. Under impact the ribs can flex to absorb energy and under extreme loading the cardboard will crumple. When tested at Imperial College against the British Standards (EN 1078) it performed 4 times better than standard expanded polystyrene helmets. Kranium was the subject of Anirudha Surabhi’s masters in Innovation Design engineering at the Royal College of Art.

Website link: Kranium: effective cycling protection

hovding collar

An alternative cylcle helmet…Hövding – an inflatable head protector

Hövding starts as a collar which deploys in an accident to protect the head, much like an airbag would. Hövding started out as Anna Haupt and Terese Alstin’s industrial design master thesis at Lund University in spring 2005. Their aim was to try to make a helmet so attractive that people would choose to wear it rather than being made to by law. 7 years later they can be bought through their website.

Website link: Hövding: the invisible bike helmet

Extreme Rhino relocation

I’m specifying the strength requirements for webbing straps on a product. I don’t think I need it quite as robust as the webbing below though.

Extreme loading on webbing straps: Rhino relocation
This photo is from the latest rhino move, where 19 of the creatures were taken by WWF, Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency, SANParks, and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife on a 1,000 mile journey across South Africa to reside in a new location in the Limpopo province. There are only about 5,000 critically endangered black rhinos in all of Africa. Because they’re not the most social of animals, they need a lot of space to roam around and play their rhino games. This means that, as populations slowly recover, they need to be spread out. In the past, moving a rhino involved tranquilizing it, loading it into a truck, and carting it over bumpy African roads. This was not good for the rhino. Sometimes, rhinos were carried by helicopters in nets, but that led to breathing problems. Today, conservationists are using a new technique–tying the animals by the ankles and flying them by helicopter–to get rhinos from one place to another.

Website link: Operation rhino drop, co.exist: world changing ideas and innovation

how to be simple

Today I’m creating patterns for a product and the following piece of advice sprang to mind.

“Saying that someone is simple is a little bit insulting, whereas it should be the highest compliment. It’s very simple to make things difficult and very difficult to make things simple. Things generally start simple, get difficult, then become simple again. The middle bit is where you learn the value of simplicity and try to regain it.”

Website link: The Guardian, 17th March 2007

Steve Jobs on design

“In most people’s vocabularies, design means veneer. It’s interior decorating. It’s the fabric of the curtains and the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a man-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.”
Steve Jobs, Fortune Magazine, 2000