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Example Projects
  • Action Figure Motion-Capture
  • Alpaca T-Shirt Hack
  • Aluminum Foil Tilt Sensor
  • Amplified Pillow Speaker
  • Sockpuppets
  • ATtiny Snap Diamond
  • ATtiny Drawdio Bracelet
  • ATTINY POV
  • Bela + Blanket
  • Bend Sensor Glove
  • Breathing Belt
  • Corset Breathing Sensor
  • Data Logging Broach
  • Datagloves Overview
  • DIY Arduino Data Gloves
  • DJ Hoodie
  • DressCode Dress Shirt
  • DressCode Examples
  • DressCode Necklace
  • DressCode Vest
  • E-Textile Datagloves Overview
  • E-Textile Sensor Wall
  • Eeontex Projects
  • Example Circuits and Code
  • Fab Intro: Continuity Bracelet
  • Fabric JoyPad
  • Frequency Finger Gloves
  • glovephone
  • Granny Square MIDI
  • Grias Di Hut
  • Jenny’s Playlist Costume
  • JoySlippers
  • Jumpsuit for actionman
  • Interactive KnitBook
  • lulu masks
  • Lulu optic fiber swatches
  • Massage my feet
  • Mouse in a Hole
  • Multiplexed Pillow
  • Musical Pillow
  • My Segments Display
  • Necklace Display - Beaded LED Matrix
  • Neoprene LED Light Pouch
  • Openwear Finger Bend Sensor
  • Penguin Control
  • Piano T-Shirt
  • Capacitive LED Fower
  • Puppeteer Costume
  • Puppeteer Gloves
  • Safetypin Dataglove
  • Sensitive Fingertips
  • Sensor Sleeve
  • Silent Pillow Speaker
  • soft walk socks
  • Solar T-Shirt
  • Solar T-shirt II
  • Sonic Insoles for Magic Shoes
  • Star Light
  • Stretch Sensitive Bracelet
  • Stirring Queen Mask
  • Textile Sensor Demo Station
  • Tie-Poly Leggings and Dataglove
  • Tilt Sensing Bracelet
  • Tilt Sensor Demo
  • Time Sensing Bracelet
  • Touch Sensitive Glove
  • TrafoPop LED Jacket
  • Wearable Sound Experiment
  • Wearable Toy Piano
  • Wearable Waste of Energy
  • Wireless JoySlippers
  • Wireless Tilt Sensing Bracelet
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    Content by Mika Satomi and Hannah Perner-Wilson
    E-Textile Tailor Shop by KOBAKANT
    The following institutions have funded our research and supported our work:

    Since 2020, Hannah is guest professor of the Spiel&&Objekt Master's program at the University of Performing Arts Ernst Busch in Berlin

    From 2013-2015 Mika was a guest professor at the eLab at Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee

    From July - December 2013 Hannah was a researcher at the UdK's Design Research Lab

    From 2010-2012 Mika was a guest researcher in the Smart Textiles Design Lab at The Swedish School of Textiles

    From 2009 - 2011 Hannah was a graduate student in the MIT Media Lab's High-Low Tech research group led by Leah Buechley


    In 2009 Hannah and Mika were both research fellows at the Distance Lab


    Between 2003 - 2009 Hannah and Mika were both students at Interface Cultures
    We support the Open Source Hardware movement. All our own designs published on this website are released under the Free Cultural Works definition

    Example Projects

    Bend Sensor Glove


    This is a quick way to make bend sensor embedded gloves. In this example, I embedded 4 sensors on finger joints, on Thumb, Index finger, Middle finger, Ring finger. I skipped pinky as it is hard to move it alone… (at least for me..) Materials: 2 sheets of 2 way stretch jersey/lycra about 20cmx20cm 1 […]

    soft walk socks


    a pair of socks for soft walking and drawing while walking. pressure sensors under the heel and toe regions of both feed sense the steps being taken. a knit stretch sensor on the elastic band that connects the feet senses the force and size of your steps. an ESP32 and powerbank are housed in a […]

    lulu masks


    Bare-bones thick copper wire circuitry that doubles as both structural frame and circuit traces. And the Lulu Bumblebee optic-fiber connector PCB works great for soldering to the thick wire! Flickr set >> https://www.flickr.com/photos/plusea/albums/72157677471035377 i scream your scream >> https://www.plusea.at/?p=7346 mask option 1: mask option 2: mask option 3: Initial sketches for the masks: RELATED WORK […]

    Breathing Belt


    Very simple solution for capturing the movement of the chest or stomach breathing using a stretch sensor knit from a stainless-steel & polyester yarn “sensor yarn”. Photos >> https://www.flickr.com/photos/plusea/albums/72157713915361228 HOW THE SENSOR WORKS The stainless steel fibers in the yarn are short, and the electrical resistance between them is high (when relaxed <1M Ohm). And […]

    Tie-Poly Leggings and Dataglove


    A pair of leggings and a glove made conductive (with piezoresistive properties) via a technique of polypyrrole polymerization, using tie-dye technique to create areas of non-conductivity.

    Bela + Blanket


    This is an example project/ experiment to use Bela board with e-Textile sensors. Here, I am making crochet blanket with exposed conductive pieces so one can use their skin resistance to “play” music by touching different part of the blanket. The blanket was originally made for a small workshop, and it was connected to Teensy […]

    Lulu optic fiber swatches


    Lulu Bumblebee demo swatches

    Swatches that showcase some of the things you can do with the Lulu Daisy – a design solution to connecting e-textiles, LEDs and optic-fibers. – 3 swatches – 6 mini crocodile clips – 1 breadboard with Teensy and crocodile clip connections for (+3V, GND, Data) demo code: cycles through one swatch at a time. was […]

    Safetypin Dataglove


    DIY Safetypin Dataglove

    A dataglove made from piezoresistive fabric with safetey pin connectors that can be pinned to different parts of the glove to capture stretch in different areas. Links: E-Textile Dataglove Overview: http://www.kobakant.at/DIY/?p=6730 Dataglove Overview: http://www.kobakant.at/DIY/?p=7114 Flickr set: https://www.flickr.com/photos/plusea/albums/72157679861886694/ Using the snap diamond breakout board design >> http://www.kobakant.at/DIY/?p=6703

    Alpaca T-Shirt Hack


    Jugend Hackt Alpaca t-shirt hack

    E-Textiles + Jugend Hackt = Interactive Alpaca T-Shirt

    Sonic Insoles for Magic Shoes


    These Sonic Insoles demonstrate a simple way of adding pressure sensors in your shoes. Fusing strips of conductive fabric to the surface of a robust base material such as felt. Cutting shapes of piezoresistive fabric for the pressure sensitive areas. Punching holes for sewing and using thick thread to hold everything together.

    E-Textile Datagloves Overview


    The following is a collection of Datagloves made using electrically conductive fabrics that react to strain (stretch, pressure) with a change in electrical resistance (piezoresistive effect), allowing them to sense the movement of the fingers. Connections are made from these fabrics to classic electrical wires and circuitboards, so that a microcontroller can translate these analog […]

    ATtiny Snap Diamond


    A breakout board for the ATtiny84. Designed to sit on the back of the hand and interface to 5 textile stretch sensors on three fingers. Reading their analog values and translating them into lighting patterns as well as sending their analog sensor data over serial rx and tx connections.

    Necklace Display – Beaded LED Matrix


    Made in the Hybrid Craft Lab of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, in an attempt to produce a wearable display.

    Stirring Queen Mask


    Made in the Hybrid Craft Lab of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, for the Jewish carnival celebration Purim, this mask is made from spoons and sticks intended for stirring sugar and milk into coffee.

    Textile Sensor Demo Station


    This is a demonstration setup that allows you to plug a variety of resistive textile sensors into a Teensy and either read the sensor values as Serial communication, or midi commands. The textile sensors are designed with their leads ending in two 9mm metal snap fasteners – 1 male, 1 female. This snap connection connects […]

    Tilt Sensor Demo


    All-in-one demo of a fabric tilt sensor. This sensor demo is a simple circuit made up of a 3V coin-cell battery (inside a conductive fabric battery pouch), 6 red LEDs and a 6-way tilt sensitive switch. The tilt switch is made up of a common GND (negative power supply from battery) which is connected to […]

    Example Circuits and Code


    A collection of simple example circuits that demonstrate the use of textile sensors and e-textile circuit techniques in combination with microcontroller programming.

    E-Textile Sensor Wall


    Intended for an introductory electronic textile sensor workshop. This wall is a platform for connecting various textile sensors and mapping them to various output (visuals, sound…) to visualize the sensor data.

    Fab Intro: Continuity Bracelet


    Super rough prototype

    Designed as an intro activity for the rotation of multiple smaller groups of students through different tool stations, this example project demonstrates the use of 5 different tools and techniques commonly used and in a fabrication lab. The circuit on the bracelet is very basic and can be used as continuity indicator. When worn, the […]

    ATtiny Drawdio Bracelet


    ATtiny Drawdio Bracelet

    This bracelet is basically a wearable continuity meter that translates the electrical resistance between two fingers into sound.

    My Segments Display


    My Segments Display

    My new Trafopop jacket! A customized segment display made from a strip of 186 Neopixels. In code the strip can be separated into as many individual segments as possible – the design of this display makes use of 20 separate segments to display the entire roman alphabet. A microphone detects sound amplitude (volume) and is […]

    Corset Breathing Sensor


    This corset sensor was made for a performance of the Helix by Michela Pelusio It uses eeonyx stretch fabric as stretch sensor to detect the movement of one’s stomach when breathing in. On this corset, there are 3 strips to take different part of the stomach. This is due to the fit of the corset, […]

    glovephone


    Glovephone is a fabric speaker on a big membrane with sleeve attached to it. To listen to sound, you need to stick your arm into the sleeve and let your palm close to your ear next to the speaker coils. This project is made during the E-Textile Pressure Cooker at STEIM in collaboration with Giacomo […]

    Sockpuppets


    The following sockpuppets are made as examples for the Soft Sensors for Soft Bodies workshop at the 2015 NODE Festival in Frankfurt, Germany. The plan is to hook up the sensors on these sockpuppets to the VVVV software via an Arduino running Firmata. Then we can map the sensor data to puppeteer virtual puppets or […]

    Frequency Finger Gloves


    Created during the E-Textile Pressure Cooker at STEIM in collaboration with Dieter Vandoren and Jonathan Reus. This pair of gloves has LEDs on one hand and photodiodes on the other. The LEDs on each finger can be pulsed (PWM) at different frequencies and the circuit on the photodiode glove translates the received light frequency directly […]

    Datagloves Overview


    The following collection of data gloves tries to give a diverse overview and includes commercially available data gloves as well as one-off DIY projects.

    Grias Di Hut


    This example titled “Greeting Hat” shows how a record and playback module intended for greetings cards is made sewable and the various components are integrated into a red hat. When the round purple record button is pressed the module records up to 10 seconds of audio through the microphone. And when the hat is tiled […]

    Jenny’s Playlist Costume


    IMG_3573

    Currently I am making costumes for the music duo “Jenny’s Playlist”. Their wish was to have costume that lights up as they perform. Yes, it is a blinky LED costume! After a long meeting with them to decide what kind of aesthetic it should be, and how it should be light up, we decided to […]

    DressCode Vest


    Example of the DressCode circuit embedded in a fancy vest.

    DressCode Necklace


    A gift for a friend from KOBAKANT. Made using the DressCode circuit.

    DressCode Dress Shirt


    DressCode is a sound reactive circuit based on PIC, developed by Seb Madgwick, Vincent Akkermans, Sophie McDonald and KOBAKANT. It has 3 output pins that gets activated as the environmental sound changes. It has auto gain feature so it adjust to the general sound amount of the environment. (for example, if you go to a […]

    ATTINY POV


    Inspired by this Instructable (http://www.instructables.com/id/LilyPad-Wrist-Band-POV/), I have tried to make a POV (Persistence Of Vision) with ATTINY, so it can be cheap and tiny. Materials used: – 8 SMD LED – ATTINY45 – 8 pin socket (not necessary) – KarlGrimm conductive thread – Lipo battery My idea is to use ATTINY45 (or 85) instead of […]

    Interactive KnitBook


    The Interactive Knit Book demonstrates examples of knited electronic elements such as switches, sensors, speakers, and heaters that cause colour change. This book was compiled as the result of the EIT ICT Connected Textiles research done at the Design Research Lab at the UdK Berlin.

    TrafoPop LED Jacket


    This jacket was made at the 2nd TrafoPop Build Your Own LED Jacket workshop in Berlin, Germany. Thanks to Thomas Gnahm and Stafan Hintz for a wonderful workshop!

    Action Figure Motion-Capture


    Want to build a full-body motion-capture system, but lazy to sew a human-size suit? This tutorial shows how to make a motion-capture costume for action figures. Flexpoint bend sensors are placed on the joints to capture their movement and position. An x-OSC is used to capture the analog sensor data and send it via WiFi […]

    DIY Arduino Data Gloves


    Sew your own pair of Data Gloves, each with 8 bend sensors for finger gesture tracking and recognistion, an ArduIMU for measuring orientation and acceleration, an RGB LED for visual feedback, and a vibration motor for haptic feedback. You’ll find the patterns, materials&parts lists and full instructions for making a pair of DIY Data Gloves […]

    Eeontex Projects


    This post compiles a list of projects for e-textile designs and sensors that make use of the Eeontex range of coated conductive fabrics produced by Eeonyx. Eeontex fabrics are fabrics coated/doped with an inherently conductive polymer, making them conductive with quite a high resistance. But the resistance changes of distance, pressure through the material, and […]

    DressCode Examples


    A series of lasercut felt designs that can host customized version of DressCode motion or sound circuits. DressCode circuits come in two variants: (1) A simple motion version that uses beaded tilt sensor to trigger LED lights to turn on and off with movement of a metal bead over patches embroidered with conductive thread. (2) […]

    Jumpsuit for actionman


    Here is a step by step, how to assemble a jumpsuit for action man figure dolls. This tutorial is to make a costume for a doll, but of course if you make a bigger size of it, it can be for human as well. This pattern was made for the Action Hero Tailoring workshop at […]

    Openwear Finger Bend Sensor


    This project uses the Openwear open design for gLove Mono by Zoe Romano and integrates a felt & Velostat bend sensor on the middle finger. A LilyPad Arduino is programmed to read the analog sensor value of the fabric bend sensor, and trigger 1, 2 or 3 LED lights to light up depending on how […]

    Silent Pillow Speaker


    This example uses an ATtiny microcontroller (programmed using Arduino!) to playback a melody every time a head is laid on the pillow. The speaker is embroidered with conductive directly onto the surface of the pillow. A magnet is mounted directly behind the coil, inside the pillow is a knit pressure sensor that detects when a […]

    Amplified Pillow Speaker


    An embroidered fabric speaker made into a pillow. Inside the pillow an amplification module hacked from a commercial device lets you easily connect your mp3 player to play back your favorite music. While the speaker might not be as loud as commercial speakers, you can very comfortably lay your head down on it to rest.

    Musical Pillow


    An example using the LilyPad Arduino sewn to a pillow with a speaker and fabric tilt sensor, playing a different note for each petal of the sensor. The pillow also has an analog pin broken out to one of it’s corners to be connected to any external analog sensors to make noise.

    Capacitive LED Fower


    Using an ATtiny microcontroller to do capacitive sensing on the stem of the flower. When the flower is picked it’s petals slowly open to reveal a glowing inner light.

    Penguin Control


    Penguin and computer

    Flickr set >> https://www.flickr.com/photos/plusea/albums/72157627567232111 Making-of:

    Multiplexed Pillow


    Super simple circuit using a 8-channel multiplexer, and may help you understand how a multiplexer works. Metal beads strung on conductive thread are connected to each of the three control pins so that they can swing and make contact with either GND(-) or VCC(+). 8 LEDs are connected to the 8 output pins of the […]

    Granny Square MIDI


    When conductive yarn is knit/crochet into small pieces, it shows pressure sensitive property. I made granny squares, which middle gray part is made with conductive yarn thus pressure sensitive. Nine of the granny squares are assembled together like the typical granny blankets, which is actually a pressure sensitive button array. The assembled granny squares are […]

    Touch Sensitive Glove


    When conductive yarn is mixed in the knit/crochet piece, it becomes pressure sensitive. This can be implemented as touch sensor or bend sensor.

    Solar T-shirt II


    Here is the second version of Solar T-Shirt with components directly sewn on with conductive thread. It is also using slightly different circuit than the other solar t-shirt. The new schematic is the following. Please not that it is using FLED (Blinking LED) instead of diode on other one. In this example I used 2N3906 […]

    Mouse in a Hole


    This example project used the Teensy to fake computer mouse input, replacing your hard-shell computer mouse with a soft mouse in a hole

    DJ Hoodie


    DJ Hoodie is a wearable interface that includes 4 channel zipper switch, fabric buttons with LED indicators and fabric pressure sensors. Two of these hoodies are connected with knitted stretch sensors on the hoods. It interfaces with computer with Arduino using Firmata library and Pduino.

    Sensor Sleeve


    Using the Sparkfun uLog module to log three channels of data and then read it out and graph it in Processing.

    Aluminum Foil Tilt Sensor


    This example shows how to construct a “textile” flexible tilt sensor from extremely cheap and available materials. Substituting conductive fabric and a metal bead for aluminum foil.

    Data Logging Broach


    Using Sparkfun’s uLog datalogging module to log tilt data a three-way fabric tilt sensor for up to three hours and then visualizing this with the help of a Processing sketch.

    Neoprene LED Light Pouch


    This soft LED light pouch is easy to make and runs with two AAA batteries. The design is super simple and fits really well with the LilyPad components. Though you can also modify a regular LED and slide switch to be sewable by soldering little loops on the end of their leads. The light is […]

    Star Light


    This is a very simple project that uses conductive thread stitched into some rope ribbon as an on/off switch. When the bow is tied, the circuit is completed and thus the light lights up, when the bow is untied there circuit is interrupted and the light is off.

    Stretch Sensitive Bracelet


    Knit from conductive thread, resistive yarn and regular yarn. This bracelet does not light up unless you stretch it, so it remains off while you wear it.

    Wearable Waste of Energy


    Sew together various soft electronic components to turn your favorite clothing item into a wearable waste of energy!

    Wearable Sound Experiment


    Produced as an example for a workshop, this sleeve combines a range of fabric components.

    Wearable Toy Piano


    A Toy Piano embedded on a T-shirt. It has 8 keys from Do to Do (1 octave). You can play simple music by wearing the shirt and pushing the fabric button on the shirt. All the components from the toy piano (batteries, speaker, circuit board) are placed on the shirt and connected with poppers. All […]

    Solar T-Shirt


    Neck-stroking wearable for sunny days. The components for this solar driven circuit are integrated in this decorative t-shirt, exploring the possibilities of textile electronics and interaction with the sun.

    Piano T-Shirt


    As an example for an electronic textiles workshop this t-shirt interfaces with a toy piano, allowing for people to play music on my back. Fabric Buttons replace the keys, poppers connect to the circuit so that it can be connected and disconnected from the t-shirt. This allows for all of the components on the t-shirt […]

    JoySlippers


    A pair of slippers for drawing, playing games and exploring alternative input. These slippers are designed with two pressure sensors embedded in each sole and can sense the weight being shifted between the toe and heel of each foot. This information is fed into a computer where a drawing application translates this analog input into […]

    Wireless JoySlippers


    This is the wireless version of the origianally wired JoySlippers. Using Xbee Direct (Multipul Xbee – Xbee- comp) communication connection, rather than spiral telephone cable.

    Massage my feet


    >> Instructable (not yet!) >> Massage me Instructable As many people told us, and also we thought of it many times.. It will be nice if there was a Massage me foot version for foot massage. So, we finally started to make one. That is the spirit of “how to get what I want”. As […]

    Puppeteer Gloves


    These gloves were originally made as part of the Perfect Human performance, and were exhibited separate from the performance in an exhibition space, which allowed for the audience to get a feel for how it might be to wear the whole Puppeteer Costume.

    Puppeteer Costume


    Exploring the use of affordable, off-the-shelf materials and basic techniques to create wireless motion capture wearables.

    Sensitive Fingertips


    Intended for use by children and their piano teachers to visualize the difference between “p” piano (soft) and “f” forte (hard). The pressure sensitive layers of fabric in the fingertips of these gloves are stretchy so that they can fit tightly.

    Tilt Sensing Bracelet


    Combining beads and other decorative elements with textiles to create tilt sensitive designs. A bracelet decorated with six conductive fabric petals and a row of beads with a metal bead on the end, makes for a simple six point tilt detection. It is also designed so that the metal bead will make contact with two […]

    Wireless Tilt Sensing Bracelet


    Based on the wired Tilt Sensing Bracelet, this version uses Xbee Direct (Xbee-Xbee) communication connection to send the digital data from the tilt sensing bracelet to a feedback bracelet which has an LED display. LEDs light up according to where the tilt sensor is making contact.

    Time Sensing Bracelet


    The Time Sensing Bracelet is a Fabric Potentiometer. You select your desired time of day by making contact in the corresponding position on your wrist – where your watch would normally be.

    Fabric JoyPad


    This joypad is made up of four conductive thread pressure sensors. The analog transition between the directions (up, right, down and left) comes from the buffering material (in this case 3 cm thick squishy packing material) that absorbs and spreads the pressure from the user’s pushing, creating a gradual transition between the inputs.