Until recently, custom tailoring (garments made to the customer’s personal specifications) was the only way to get clothing that fit your body shape perfectly. For most people, the cost of customization is prohibitive. But the invention of reactive fibers and innovative knitting processes are changing the textile industry.
“We all wear clothes and shoes,” says Sasha MicKinlay MArch ’23, a recent MIT architecture graduate. “It’s a human need. But humans also need to express themselves. I like the idea of tailoring clothing in a sustainable way. This dress is more sustainable than traditional fashion, both for consumers and producers.”
McKinlay, a textile designer and researcher at the Self-Assembly Lab, designed the 4D knitted dress with Ministry of Supply, a fashion company specializing in high-tech clothing. The dress combines a variety of technologies to create a personalized fit and style. Heat-activated yarn, computerized knitting and robotic activation around each piece create a sculptural fit. A team in the supply department led decisions on stabilizing yarns, colors, original sizes and overall design.
“Everyone’s body is different,” said Skylar Tibbits, associate professor in the Department of Architecture and founder of the Self-Assembly Lab. “Even if you wear the same size as another person, you’re not actually the same.”
active textiles
Students in the Self-Assembly Lab have been working on dynamic textiles for several years. They make yarns that can change shape, change properties, change insulation or become breathable. Previous applications for tailoring clothing include making sweaters and face masks. Tibbits said the 4D knit dress is the culmination of everything the students learned from working with reactive textiles.
McKinley helps produce the reactive yarns, conduct conceptual designs, develop knitting technology, and program the lab’s industrial knitting machines. Once a garment design is programmed into the machine, it can quickly produce multiple garments. Reactive yarns are used in the design, allowing the dress to appear in a variety of styles, such as pintucks, pleats, high-waist or cinched waist.
“Style is important,” McKinley said. “Most people focus on size, but I think style is what makes clothes special. We are all constantly evolving as people and I think our style is constantly evolving as well. Once they adapt, people focus on personal expression. “
Danny Griffin MArch ’22 is currently a graduate student in architectural design with no background in apparel production or the fashion industry. Tibbits invited Griffin to join the team because of his experience with construction robotics projects. Griffin converts the thermal activation process into a programmable robot program that can precisely control its application.
“When we apply heat, the fibers shorten, causing the textile to bunch up in specific areas, effectively tightening the shape, just like when we’re cutting a garment,” Griffin said. “It took a lot of trial and error to figure out how to orient the robot and heat gun. Heat needed to be applied in precise locations to activate the fibers on each garment. Another challenge was setting the temperature and heating time.”
It took us a while to figure out how the robot could Reach all areas of the garment.
“We can’t use commercial heat guns — like handheld hair dryers — because they’re too big,” Griffin said. “We needed a more compact design. Once we figured that out, it became really fun to script the robot.”
A garment can start with one design – such as pintucks on the chest – and then be worn for several months and then reheated to change its appearance. Subsequent heating can further customize the garment.
Beyond fit and style
Gihan Amarasiriwardena ’11, co-founder and president of Ministry of Supply, said efficiently producing clothing is a “huge challenge” in the fashion industry.
“A lot of times you guess what the style is going to be for a season,” he said. “Sometimes styles don’t work out well, or certain sizes don’t sell. They can be heavily discounted or end up in landfill.”
The term “fast fashion” describes clothing that is cheap, trendy and easily discarded by consumers. They are designed and produced quickly to keep up with current trends. Tibbits says 4D knit dresses are the opposite of fast fashion. Unlike the fashion industry’s traditional “cut and sew” process, 4D knit dresses are made entirely in one piece, virtually eliminating waste.
“From a global perspective, you don’t have a lot of excess inventory because the dresses are custom-made to your size,” Tibbits said.
McKinley said she hopes the use of the new technology will reduce the amount of wasted inventory that retailers typically have at the end of each season.
“The garment can be tailored to accommodate these changes in style and taste,” she says. “It might also be able to absorb some of the size variation that retailers need to stock. Instead of extra small, small, medium, large, retailers could offer one garment for a smaller size and one garment for a larger size. sizes and extra-large sizes. Of course, these are sustainable points that are good for consumers.”
The Self-Assembly Laboratory has been collaborating with the Ministry of Supply on active textile projects for several years. Late last year, the team debuted a 4D knitted dress at the company’s flagship store in Boston, with robotic arms moving around the dress as customers looked on. For Amarasiriwardena, it was an opportunity to gauge interest and receive feedback from customers interested in trying the dress.
“If there’s a demand, we can create it quickly,” Amarasiriwardena said, unlike the usual design and manufacturing process, which can take years.
Griffin and McKinley attended the demonstration and were pleased with the results. For Griffin, he sees many different avenues for the project as the “technical hurdles” are overcome.
“This experience made me want to try more,” he said.
McKinley is also open to experimenting with more styles.
“I Hopefully this research project will help people rethink or re-evaluate their relationship with clothes,” McKinley said. “Right now, when people buy a piece of clothing, it only has a ‘look.’ But how exciting would it be to buy a piece of clothing and redesign it so that it changes and evolves as you change or as the seasons or styles change? I hope that’s what people get out of it. “