Craftzine.com blog: Fashion Tech Archives

Archive: Fashion Tech

June 30, 2009

How-To: Nightlife Necklace

Over on Etsy's Storque, Diana Eng has a tutorial from her book, Fashion Geek, on making this LED "nightlife" necklace.

June 29, 2009

Aram Bartholl is pioneering twitter fashion with his Tweet Bubble Series (shirt pocket version pictured). Sort of like wearing your heart on your sleeve, made in four styles including one with conductive thread affecting a thermochromic sweatshirt! Via F.A.T.

June 19, 2009

Crochet Headphone Hat

My favorite blog-I-can't-actually-understand, 203gow (a crafty Japanese woman who makes the most incredible crochet things), just posted this headphone hat. It's like an electronic sea anemone growing from a kids' bike helmet, and I love it. If you can read Japanese, please translate for us!

June 3, 2009

LED dress for Bachelorette

Karen Curley and Lindsay Broomfield made this LED dress for the band Bachelorette using a LilyPad Arduino and some LilyPad sewable LEDs. Check out the Flickr set. Via Fashioning Technology.

More:

May 29, 2009

Thermochromatic Embroidery Workshop This Weekend

If you're in Brooklyn this weekend, you may be able to attend this Thermochromatic Embroidery Workshop being offered at 3rd Ward tomorrow.

Take embroidery to the next level! In this class we will make a simple hat and embroider a design on it that is interactive. I’ll teach you how to use thermochromic ink that, when wired up correctly, changes color with the flick of a switch on your hat. You must have basic hand sewing skills or at least some manual dexterity. A basic concept of electronics is helpful, but a willingness to follow directions would suffice.

Via Fashioning Technology.

May 19, 2009

Glowing Button Cycling Jacket

One of the most common DIY LilyPad Arduino uses seems to be in bike wear. I don't know if it's because bike riders like electronics or what, but here's another one! Instructables user kempton made this very attractive cycling jacket with LED buttons, and wrote up a detailed step-by-step tutorial for making your own, complete with turn signals.

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May 9, 2009

How-To: LED Robot Embroidery

In this Threadbanger episode, learn to sew a simple circuit to create an embroidered robot with glowing LED eyes. Diana Eng shows you this project from her book, Fashion Geek.

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May 8, 2009

CRAFT Video: Color Changing LED Brooch

Sew up this little colorful brooch using a LilyPad tri-color LED and three small potentiometers for a customizable color wardrobe embellishment. No programming required!

Subscribe to the CRAFT Podcast in iTunes, or download the m4v video.

Potentiometers are variable resistors. They change the amount of electricity that can pass through them based on the turning of the knob, thereby dimming and brightening the three channels of the tri-color LED. The colors mix and diffuse through the roving, producing any color in the rainbow. Here's the front,

and the back,

and here's the diagram for sewing the components together.

Materials and tools:

conductive thread (E-sewing Kit)
coincell battery (E-sewing Kit)
sewable battery holder (E-sewing Kit)
LilyPad tri-color LED (Sparkfun)
3 small 1K-ohm potentiometers (Digikey)
small on-off pushbutton switch (Digikey)
brooch template (cardboard or illustration board)
fabric
needle and thread
pin back
wool roving
felting needle
felting surface (upholstery foam scrap works great)
scissors
pliers
alligator clips for prototyping

More:

In the Maker Shed:

LilyPad E-Sewing Kit

May 5, 2009

Fashion Hacking with Diana Eng, May 10th in Brooklyn, NY

Nycrfashionhacking
Diana Eng is hosting a Fashion Hacking: Open Working Studio event on May 10th at the NYC Resistor in Brooklyn (397 Bridge Street, Floor 5).

Diana writes:

I will be bringing a bit of Project Runway to my hacker group, NYC Resistor on May 10th when we host Fashion Hacking: Open Working Studio. Come and hack fashion with us. BYOC (bring your own clothes) and we'll have the tailoring tools, sewing machines, conductive thread, LED's, soldering irons, and the Laser Cutter to help you hack clothes into fashionable technology. Fashion designers and hardware hackers will be on hand to help you.

This is an open working studio which means that you are free to circulate, work on your own project and look at other projects. Come to session 1, come to session 2, come to both sessions.

Session 1, 1-3 pm, $20
Session 2, 3-5 pm, $20
Buy tickets: http://fashionhacking.eventbrite.com/

How-To: Mineral Makeup

Sarah James at Instructables shows us how easy it is to make your own mineral makeup. She writes:

Mineral makeup is more than just a new beauty trend - it offers health benefits for skin as well. And now you can make it at home! It's made of all natural, finely ground minerals from the earth, without many of the chemicals, dyes, and preservatives found in traditional makeup. I have VERY sensitive skin, and have had trouble in the past with commercial makeup (even store-bought mineral makeup!) being too heavily fragrances, or containing irritants like bismuth oxychloride. This formula eliminates classic irritants so that it's kinder to the skin. Since it contains titanium dioxide which has anti-inflammatory properties, it also has a calming effect on the skin, particularly important if you suffer from inflammatory problems such as rosacea or acne. AND I've added micronized zinc oxide to give it an SPF rating, helping to further protect skin from damage and wrinkles. By making your own at home, you can control not only the purity of the ingredients you use, you can also create a custom color, matched exactly to your own skin tone!

April 28, 2009

Incredible Electronic Dress

Via the CRAFT Flickr pool, Marisa Ranalli made this totally amazing handmade electronic and fiber dress powered by LilyPad Arduinos and included LEDs and nitinol wire (an alloy that changes shape when electricity is applied). It's her final project in the Textiles program at Sheridan College in Toronto, and it's totally rad! I'd love to see a video about it. It will be shown at the Lennox Contemporary Gallery from April 30th-May 10th.

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April 24, 2009

Nintendo Purse

Gareth @ MAKE points out Jeri Ellsworth's amazing purse with a built-in classic Nintendo system, complete with Velcro-attached controllers. It's also a Commodore 64. It would be perfect for impressing your date or even just on long car trips! Photo by Rose White.

April 6, 2009

LilyPad Arduino Workshop in Berkeley This Summer

Want to get your hands working with the LilyPad Arduino system? There's a workshop being held in Berkeley this summer on the topic. It will be two full days of getting started with the LilyPad and conductive materials for use in your own projects, taught by Adrian Freed. Via F ashioning Technology.

By cutting, sewing, sticking, weaving, and layering unusual e-textiles we will build interactive clothing and musical instruments in a collaborative workshop environment. We will connect our fabric pressure, stretch, bend, and displacement sensors to lilypad e-sewing computing platform, we will sew connections to arrays of leds and sound makers. We will explore CNMAT's extensive library of e-textiles and more advanced techniques such as computer controlled embroidery and laser cutting. We will look at variants and alternatives to the lilypad such as wireless xbee or uOSC.

E-textile Workshop

July 25-26, 10 AM-5 PM

CNMAT, Berkeley, CA

Fee: $300 (includes materials fee with lilypad system you keep after the class)

More:

CRAFT Video: LilyPad Arduino 101

New Soft Circuit Kits in the Maker Shed and Massive Soft Electronics Roundup

Electronic Embroidery/Sewing Kit

March 28, 2009

Touch Sensitive LilyPad Arduino Hoodie

Instructables user kanjun writes:

This tutorial will show you how to create a garment that changes its behavior depending on how conductive you are. It detects conductivity through iron-on conductive fabric that we will use, and it will light up and sing different notes depending on how you touch the conductive fabric. We'll be using sewable electronics (the LilyPad arduino module) and conductive threads and fabrics so that your garment will be soft and washable.

More:

CRAFT Video: LilyPad Arduino 101

March 24, 2009

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: The Fashion Show Night

(Photos by: Doug Eng and Shane O'Neill)

On March 19th, I had my book release party for Fashion Geek: Clothes, Accessories, Tech at Pop Lounge. It included a fashion presentation of all of the DIY electronic fashions in the book. Here's a look behinds the scenes of making the DIY projects into a fashion presentation.

Jen Parker and Elizabeth Owusu were the hair stylists armed with headbands to give the models' hair Gossip Girl style. About an hour before the show an EL wire driver breaks! Edith Kollath steps in and helped hand sew a replacement EL wire driver on the back of a model's skirt, just 15 minutes before the show's start time.

Finally, the models are in place on Fashion Geek platforms. Fashion Indie did a fantastic job running the event. They helped find the location Pop Lounge, managed the guest list, told the models when to smile, and the DJ's where to stand. As the guests begin pouring in, someone noted that the nerds tended to congregate towards the back of the room, while the fashion designers stood in the front near the models. Everyone munched on bacon toffee and chocolate covered Pop Rocks from Danielle Bilton. We listened to digital music from Eric Skiff. Then DJ Joey Mariano played digital music live from his hacked guitar and hacked Game Boy. In the end, I think everyone all had a good time.

You can watch a video of the fashion presentation by Bre Pettis here:

Thanks to CRAFT for letting me share my behind the scenes with you. I'll be back here later next month with a fashion project. Until then, catch up with me on my blog Fashionnerd.com.

Here's all the Behind the Scenes posts:

March 20, 2009

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: Quick Update

(Photo by: Doug Eng)

Hi Everyone! The Fashion Geek fashion presentation happenned last night. I was very pleased with how it all turned out. I'll have the full scoop with lots of photos and details to follow on Monday. Have a great weekend!

March 18, 2009

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: DIY Fashion Show

Only one more day until the big electronic fashion show for the release of my book Fashion Geek: Clothes, Accessories, Tech on March 19th. There are so many things that need to get done to make a fashion show happen. Since CRAFT is all about DIY, here are all the steps you need to follow to put on your own fashion show.

1. Models: Designers find models by holding a casting call, an interview for models. At the casting call models show designers their portfolio, their model walk, and poses. Models often have comp cards (the model business card) with photos of themselves and measurements. Where do the models come from? An established designer will call a model agency and request models. If you are a small designer just starting out, you could put up flyers around your school or post an ad on Craigslist. The information you need to post for a casting call is the location and time (usually a 2 – 4 hour time slot). Then you wait for the models to show up.

I only needed four models for my fashion show. So I simply called Empire Model Agency and they sent some girls over. Above you can see my model call being filmed by MTV while a model strikes a pose. MTV is filming my show sponsor Fashion Indie for their TV show True Lives.

2. Runway/Platforms/Podium: There are two types of fashion shows: a runway show and a fashion presentation. In fashion presentations, the models pose on platforms or podiums for the duration of the show (a couple of hours). Fashion presentations are cheaper than runway shows and have been very popular this fashion season due to the recession. You can rent platforms, but they are very easy to make. I made my own platforms with the help of Dave Clausen.

3. Location: A lot of places like bars, restaurants, and clubs are willing to host a fashion show (for free) because fashion shows make a location hip, and more fun for the patrons. Plus, fashion shows have the potential to bring in a lot of press. So don't be afraid to ask for the manager at your favorite hangout and pitch a fashion show.

My show will be at PopLounge right above PopBurger and across the street from FAO Schwartz.

4. Press: Let's face it, while fashion shows are a lot of fun, it's not worth it to go through all of the trouble if you aren't going to get some publicity. And if you are having a show in the industry with buyers, the press are the first people you should invite.

The Fashion Geek fashion presentation has press coverage ranging from ThreadBanger to MTV to Popular Science. I contacted a lot of press about my release party, but that doesn't mean that they will all show up. If you have trouble getting press to your event, keep trying. Only a percentage of the press contacted will show up and this is true for all fashion shows.

5. Styling: Styling is very important. You aren't just showing clothes, you are showing a way to wear the clothes. Not everyone will wear the clothing this way in real life. Instead, you are showing the clothes worn in a way that best represents the theme of your collection. You style the clothes with accessories: shoes, jewelry, hosiery, hats, hair pieces, glasses, etc.

The style for this fashion presentation that I'm going for is "Geek Chic." I love all of the textured colored stockings that I saw going down the runways in Europe, so I am layering up stockings. A colored stocking underneath, and a knit/lace one on top. (I spent the most money to style stockings.) I grabbed some matching shoes from an unmentionable cheap shoe place. (If I were having a larger fashion show, I would have a shoe sponsor who would lend me shoes for the models.) And lastly, I grabbed a couple of pairs of fake glasses. The rest of the accessories will come from the book.

6. Hair and Make-Up: This is a big part of styling. Designers usually collect photos from magazines of hair styles and make-up that they like. These are called tear sheets, and they are shown to the hair and make-up artist. Sometimes there is a hair and make-up test before the show.

I grabbed tear sheets from the TV show, Gossip Girl. I really like the romantic locks of Blair and her posse. Gossip Girl is very young, girly and playful. I want to capture this for my electronic fashions so that they will be friendly to girls and help them realize that electronics are more than something just for geeky boys.

7. Music: Music can enhance the theme of your fashion presentation. Nobody wants to watch models in silence. And of course, it's way more difficult for a model to strut without any music! I am having circuit bending DJs and digital music to match the digital clothing at my show from Joey Mariano and Eric Skiff.

More from me on Friday after my Fashion Geek presentation!

March 16, 2009

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: Designing Fashion with Electronics

My new book Fashion Geek: Clothes, Accessories, Tech is out in bookstores now. It teaches how to make 13 DIY electronic fashion projects using things like LEDs, hacked pedometers, and conductive thread. I had a lot of fun making this book, and the best part was designing fashions for other people to make.

Fashion Geek is crafts meets fashion. I followed the fashion design process: gathering inspiration, sketching, making samples, and drafting patterns to create designs that everyone can DIY. Most electronic clothing is futuristic and sci-fi looking. But to me the future is now. I want to make fashion and technology cute, friendly, and accessible to everyone — something that everyone can make and wear. My inspiration is cute things like Tokidoki + J-pop (Japanese pop culture) with a bit of a hipster edge to make the style more wearable for today. I use a lot of trim, ribbons, bells, beads, and cut-out flowers because it's the little things that make a difference.

Even though there are many cute designs and embellishments, Fashion Geek is not only for girls. Projects like the EL Wire Shoes were inspired by the brightly colored fun clothing of Kid Robot and Japanese hip hop clothing brand Bathing Ape. I wanted to give the shoes an under light glow, but how could I add this without making it look tacky? I thought back to the super cushioned Nike Air Jordans, and added the glow in the cushion. Now we have a shoe with under lighting that is perfect for the Bathing Ape, Kid Robot, and post-Heatherette customer. In true hipster fashion, there is of course a hoodie, the Headphone Hoodie, that plays music in the hood.

My favorite design is the Felt Flower Flash Drive, a USB thumb drive necklace, which I wear all the time. It's oversized and truly inspired by the cute things of J-pop. You can see it plugged into the computer, and me wearing it while MTV films my model call. Stay tuned for my next CRAFT entry Wednesday as I cast models, grab hair and make-up tear sheets, and throw together a few more garments Project Runway-style for the big Fashion Geek presentation this Thursday, March 19th. You can also catch up with me on my blog, Fashionnerd.com.

March 13, 2009

Checkin' In: Fashion Nerd Diana Eng

As you may have read in Natalie's post yesterday, Diana Eng will be guest blogging on our site starting on Monday (yay!). So it seemed like a perfect time to check in with her on the newest happs in her crafty world. But first, let's take a look at what Diana has contributed to the pages of CRAFT magazine.

Back in CRAFT Volume 01 (October 2006), we ran a feature on Diana, highlighting how many of her designs seamlessly blend her diverse loves of science, technology, and fashion design. Diana, along with fellow designer Emily Albinski, had put on a sizzling math-inspired runway show at the first Bay Area Maker Faire (April 2006) that featured such innovative designs as Diana's Inflatable Dress, which changes shape as it inflates and deflates:

Then, in CRAFT Volume 03, Diana provided us with a how-to on making a Harajuku-inspired Japanese Punk Shirt:

As well as the adorable Origanimals how-to for folding dinner napkins into animal shapes:

These days, Diana's big news is that she has a book that just came out called Fashion Geek, where she teaches you how to take your clothes and accessories and add high-tech flair to them. She's got a great video demonstrating the DIY Shoes from Fashion Geek on her Fashion Nerd blog. Here's the video:

Be sure to look for Diana guest blogging here on Craftzine starting next week and pick up back issues of CRAFT in the Maker Shed!

Book Review: Switch Craft by Alison Lewis with Fang-Yu Lin

Switch Craft: Battery-Powered Crafts to Make and Sew by Alison Lewis with Fang-Yu Lin Book Site

I'm so excited about Alison Lewis' new book, Switch Craft: Battery-Powered Crafts to Make and Sew. Alison of Switch merges technology into fashion, home, and product design with 20 step-by-step projects. Each project in the book is easy to follow and has accompanying illustrated diagrams as well beautiful color photographs. I also love the spiral binding so the book can easily lay flat while you are working on a project. And, if you aren't technically savvy, no worries! Alison is an awesome teacher. She teaches fashion technology at Parsons and I've seen her teach first hand at the many workshops she's done at Maker Faire over the years. She walks you through the process -- teaching you about the materials, safety issues, and electronics. Just flipping through the colorful book is inspiring in itself.

Here are a few of my favorite projects from the book:

Pictured left is Pillow Talk, a pillow that lets you talk on your phone! Just hook it up your mobile phone and talk away. On the right, is the stylish Petal Shuffle newsboy hat. The hat hides your iPod shuffle and the beaded pedals allow you to control the volume and song choice. There's no soldering involved at all on this one so it's very easy to make.

This Firefly Bracelet merges sewing techniques along with electronic components to make it glimmer. Plus I'm in love with all the colors in the bracelet. This may have to be the first project I tackle.

Alison showed Maker Faire Austin attendees how to make this Shiny Clutch.

Catch up with Alison Lewis and updates on the book Switch Craft at the Switch Blog.

And if you are attending SXSW, don't miss Alison's panel:
The Convergence of High-End Design, Fashion and Technology
SXSW
Tuesday, March 17th
5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Room 8

Fashion Tech Home | Next >

Craft:

How-To: Nightlife Necklace

Twitter Fashion

Crochet Headphone Hat

LED dress for Bachelorette

Thermochromatic Embroidery Workshop This Weekend

Glowing Button Cycling Jacket

How-To: LED Robot Embroidery

CRAFT Video: Color Changing LED Brooch

Fashion Hacking with Diana Eng, May 10th in Brooklyn, NY

How-To: Mineral Makeup

Incredible Electronic Dress

Nintendo Purse

LilyPad Arduino Workshop in Berkeley This Summer

Touch Sensitive LilyPad Arduino Hoodie

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: The Fashion Show Night

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: Quick Update

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: DIY Fashion Show

Behind the Scenes of Fashion Geek: Designing Fashion with Electronics

Checkin' In: Fashion Nerd Diana Eng

Book Review: Switch Craft by Alison Lewis with Fang-Yu Lin

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