5 Big Ideas That Will Change The Way You Wear Clothes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxsOHyJqoiM
Everyday Spacesuits
Performance clothing brand Ministry of Supply’s Apollo dress shirt is literally space age: it’s made with the same Phase Change Material that NASA devised to control astronauts’ body temperature.
“PCM works like a battery,” explains Gihan Amarasiriwardena, Ministry of Supply’s co-founder and president. “When you’re warm, the material absorbs heat, wicking it away from your body to cool you down. Then when your temperature drops, it releases that heat to warm you up.” Forget hot-and-cold flushes on your commutes and step back permanently from office battles over the thermostat.
Named after the cover of Charles Fraser-Smith, the real-life inspiration for James Bond’s Q, Ministry of Supply is a rare fashion brand to emerge from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology: the label’s other product launches include “3D” blazers constructed from a foam-like fabric that requires less tailoring engineering to give it structure, plus odour-controlling, coffee-infused “smart” socks.
“We’re inventors, not designers,” says Amarasiriwardena. “We’re comfortable being first with many of the products we release, testing and iterating and changing as needed. For more established, traditional brands, that risk and uncertainty isn’t ingrained in how they operate.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIEVoCHj808
Superhero Fabrics
A common complaint about fashion is that nothing is built to last any more. That will change if a next-gen fabric makes it to the mainstream: synthetic spider silk. It’s already being used by some brands, including Adidas – its Biofabric prototype crep does whatever a spider silk can. Fellow Teutonic trailblazers AMSilk have genetically engineered E Coli bacteria to produce Biosteel, which once spun is light and elastic yet stronger than its namesake metal: a pencil-thick strand could catch a fully loaded, 380-ton Boeing 747. So at least on paper it should comfortably handle beaten-up gym gear or the hole worn into the crotch of your favourite jeans.
