Smart Clothing & Fabrics for Sports, Health & Fashion Garments, Ladies & Mens Smart Wear

Using technology, scientists have developed fabrics from which clothing is created to benefit sports, fitness and even the medical field.

Combining fashion and tech-savvy fabrics is already a trend, as sports and fitness wear transcend their uses and have become fashionable everyday wear. Several fashion designers now use this type of pure fabric for their creations.

What is Smart Fashion?

The concept of ‘smart fashion’, or ‘tech fashion’, encompasses several types of clothing, including garments made from ‘augmented reality technology’ to create ‘accessories powered by artificial intelligence’. While this pushes fashion boundaries, it also lets customers enjoy clothes, accessories and other products that integrate technology and designers to create innovative items. The buzzwords ‘digital garments’ and ‘wearable tech’ are bandied about, to describe garments that offer consumers an interactive, immersive experience.

Smart garments use technology to adjust to the wearer’s temperature and environment, which enhances comfort and performance. Technology also enables manufacturers to authenticate their designs using blockchain technology and give consumers a detailed history of the garment, from the type of fabric used to when it is sold. It often also provides data about the product’s sustainability.

Tech apps are currently being used to make buying clothes a different experience. Using specific algorithms, businesses can predict trends and customer preferences. Trying on clothes in a virtual setting is becoming commonplace, which enables customers to see what a garment will look like when they wear it, which reduces returns that come back and makes a garment shop a much more targeted experience.

Let’s Talk Tech Clothing Collections

Artificial intelligence will enable our garments to do more than just be worn. Tech wear can adjust garment temperature to keep us warm, or cool. As a result, we won’t need to wear layers to keep out the winter cold, which means we’ll save on textile waste. (Read about The Constant Textile Waste Problem here.)

But there’s more…

Smart garments look and feel like everyday wear, but offer a technical twist. Some swiftly tech clothing uses advanced textiles with intricately interwoven circuits, and other technologically advanced utility clothes and accessories brands have added detectors or hardware to boost their functionality and track biometric and physical data like temperature and heart rate. Some garments can connect to apps via a secondary device like a smartwatch, letting users keep track of their daily habits and workouts.   

·      As we become more aware of the importance of sustainability to protect the environment, ‘green’ biodegradable textiles are becoming a necessity rather than a luxury. For some inspiration, read about The Importance of Biodegradable Textiles as Eco-Friendly Fabric.

·      Smart garments look and fit much like regular fashion items and are often just as fashionable. But they include a technical element that sets them apart, with circuits and detectors cleverly interwoven into the materials to track specific information, like temperature and heart rate.

·      Technologies used to design and manufacture high-tech clothes and accessories include biometric analytics, delivered by combining 5G with IoT technology, enabling businesses to manage inventories in a retail environment or monitor temperature and even how healthy we are, monitoring blood pressure, glucose levels and ECG. The detectors are linked via Bluetooth or WiFi to software or an app, enabling the healthcare system to track patients’ vitals.

We’ve already written a comprehensive guide to Artificial Intelligence, entitled The Role of AI in Fashion Design & Textile Manufacturing, which you’re welcome to take a look at.

Shop Smart Clothing Collections

Of course, the activewear and sports market covering men, women and children is at the top with various innovations. Let’s take a look at some of the items we can shop for:

1.     New Age Activewear

   Fitness tracking helps us monitor our performance while we keep fit. Examples of this type of activewear include the Ralph Lauren PoloTech Crew Neck T-shirt Collections which connect with smartphone apps to track fitness activities for users. Another fitness brand using tech is Sensoria, whose sensor-embedded sports bras do the same. There’s also Nadi, whose yoga pants correct posture and alignment to enhance poses.

   One exceptionally innovative brand is German company Lunative, whose Electric Apparel provides battery-operated lights for their high tech shorts, pants, shirts and coats ranges to help wearers like night joggers stay visible when it’s dark. Another popular brand is Enflux, whose motion capture apparel does just that – service with the touch of a button!

2.     Tech Shoes

Manufacturers install miniature detectors in select sports shoes to monitor heart rate, speed, temperature, activities like sitting, standing, walking and running, GPS coordinates, sports form and technique and other fitness measurements. Some brands of shoes include data to customise the shoe fit according to a person’s foot shape, size and pressure points while exercising. This information is processed to personalise the shoes’ insoles to ensure the best fit, support and cushioning.

3.    Intelligent Socks

We mentioned the sports brand Sensoria, earlier. They also manufacture ‘intelligent’ stretch tech socks that measure the pressure the wearer puts on their feet, and analyse how their feet land when walking and running. This is done through advanced textile detectors built into every sock that communicate via an anklet device. This clever app, once connected, offers tips on improving your walking and running techniques, tracks steps, speed, distance travelled and even altitude. If you pay a monthly subscription, you receive monthly training plans. This is a great idea for birthday and Christmas gifts, so check out where these are on sale!

Owlet is a brand that takes socks to another level entirely. Their award-winning Baby Monitor smart socks track your baby’s well-being. Once you’ve slipped the socks on, exceptional ‘pulse-oximetry technology’ monitors the baby’s sleep trends including how many hours they sleep, how often they wake up every night, and sleep quality. But that’s not all. It also tracks the baby’s oxygen level and heart rate. The app syncs to a mobile phone (Android or iPhone) and delivers data as something happens. The latest Generation 3 model includes Owlet’s Connected Care Platform which identifies potential health issues, sleep irregularities and various illnesses like pneumonia, chronic lung disorders and heart defects.

4.     Savvy Swimwear Collection

French fashion brand Neviano is just one of several manufacturers producing exciting swimsuit options that include UV detectors to monitor the amount of UV rays the wearer is exposed to. Neviano UV Protect Swim suits include a removable waterproof UV sensor in a medallion shape that warns the wearer when they have spent too much time in the sun. The app, which links to Android or iOS smartphones, monitors the temperature while the swim suits are worn and warns the wearer to move into the shade or add sunscreen.

What the Future Holds

When it comes to ‘smart’ apparel, healthcare will take centre stage this year as health monitoring through what we wear becomes more prevalent. According to a study undertaken by Science Daily, European researchers have developed a smart fabric that will monitor ‘muscular overload’ and help ‘prevent repetitive strain injury’.

Of course, there’s more. The same team is researching to develop a pregnancy belt that would monitor a baby’s heartbeat and shirts that monitor muscle fatigue during sports training. Get ready to shop for even more innovative products!

Tech fabrics to assist with injury prevention are also on the cards. These materials will have detectors woven into them to detect muscle strain and tension, to stop wearers from over-exerting or injuring themselves. The fabrics also provide compression or heat to aid recovery or reduce injury risks.

It won’t be long before you can put shirts on before you train to alert you when to stop to avoid strains, sprains or other injuries. Athletes and sports fanatics can use their garments to monitor them while they exercise – what on earth will they think of next?