You’ve seen fashion-tech, you’ve seen health-tech, but have you seen all three in one? SENSOREE‘s mood sweater – yes, you read that right! – began as a research project to make a wearable technology for people with ADHD and autism, conditions that are both heavily connected to emotional state. Unlike the heat-sensitive mood rings that had little girls in a frenzy, Sensoree uses “therapeutic bio media” to monitor the body and respond with visual and tactile states, creating an extension of the self and making the wearer’s mood a silent but powerful contributor to the conversation.
The GER: Mood Sweater has grown beyond its therapy roots into an interactive fashion project that projects the wearer’s mood to light up the room. For example, the pink glow of the collar in the image above means the model is “ruffled” – that is, excited or aroused. SENSOREE has assigned a range of colours to various moods as follows:
Here’s how it works: sensors located on the hands read excitement levels through the palms, and translates that data into a palette of color values. The high, bowl-shaped collar contains LED lights that shine onto the body and through the fabric to create an ambiance of the wearer’s mood – or, as SENSOREE calls it, “Extimacy.”
def. EXTIMACY /ɛ́gztəməsi/ noun: externalized intimacy
SENSOREE’s concept of extimacy is a new form of bodily communication. Like facial expressions and silent gestures, extimacy conveys one person’s feelings to another in a way beyond words. This is why the Mood Sweater would benefit wearers with severe forms of autism, which may hinder their ability to convey the way they are feeling. With a mood sweater, friends and family can tell how the wearer is feeling and know without disturbing them whether or not they are open to company.
Though not yet available on the market, SENSOREE has opened up pre-ordering for a limited run of 100 mood sweaters, which will be custom-sized, signed, and numbered by SENSOREE. As it says on the pre-order page, this is bespoke design for the unique individual, where technology becomes personal.
Would you wear a mood sweater?
This is not a sponsored post. All images belong to SENSOREE.
