What happens when an ex-designer for Valentino associates with an interaction technology professional? A new expertise takes place and wearable technology becomes intimate with fashion in a company name Cute Circuit. If you are part of those who always watches red carpets around the world, dying to see who wears what, you may already be familiar with the unique fashion label. Indeed, on November first, Nicole Scherzinger worn, for the launching of the new 4G mobile network in London, the world’s first Haute Couture Twitter dress.
The singer and X-Factor judge, which I cannot seem to stop mixing up with Kim Kardashian, could not be ignored. With the hashtag #tweetthedress, her fans could tweet short sentences who would briefly scroll on Scherzinger’s dress. The concept was made up by Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz, the two creators of the brand. Founded in 2004, Cute Circuit has already made his way to the top. First, with his original concept but, also, by reaching the high expectations of their extravagant clientele. Among others, the designers have made special commands for Katy Perry, U2 and Laura Pausini.
Honors have also been attributed to the fashion label. For instance, one of their creations, the Galaxy Dress is a part of the permanent collection «Fast Foward: Inventing the Future » at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. The dress is the world’s largest wearable LEDs display (24,000 full color LEDs). The dress’ battery lasting only 30 minutes, the designers managed to make it look good even without the lights. The areas without LEDs are decorated with more than 4000 hand-applied Swarovski crystals that make a gradient from clear crystal to bright pink.
But, my favorite piece is the hug shirt, which recreates the feeling of a hug, no matter the distance. Embedded in the shirt there are sensors that feel the strength of the touch, the skin warmth and the heartbeat rate of the sender and actuators that recreate the sensation of touch, warmth and emotion of the hug to the shirt of the distant loved one. To do so, you need a smart phone, which uses Bluetooth signals to send those hug informations to your friend’s hug shirt. If you do not own a shirt but still want to give some affection to your friend, the HugMe software can help you create the digital feeling of your hug. The hug shirt was awarded by Time Magazine as one of the Best Inventions of The Year and also awarded with the First Prize at Ciberart Conference in Bilbao, Spain.
CuteCircuit does not offer only on-command dresses. Each season, they create an Haute Couture collection as well as a Prêt-à-Porter. My opinion about this last one is that they should continue innovating with magnificent dresses and upcoming technologies and forget about the tunics and the dresses glowing in the dark. As for me, I would like to see a wedding dress made the CuteCircuit way, it would surely give the bride another reason to be the center of attention.
Written by Ruby-Maude Rioux
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