Conference Agenda

Driven by the potential of smart textiles, shape-changing structures, living textiles, and sustainable manufacturing methods, designers seek to push the boundaries of weaving. However, most existing industrial technologies are designed for mass-producing simple, flat fabrics. This has narrowed the collective understanding of the design potential of woven textiles, thereby restricting the development of complex, three-dimensional, and animated textiles. We present a toolkit, developed through an exploratory workshop and focus group discussions with academic and industry-based designers, that enables exploration and expansion of the design space for woven textiles. The card deck and canvas provide a shared language to externalise and interrogate existing ways of thinking, while a modified frame loom enables hands-on exploration of new possibilities. The toolkit demonstrates how combining analytical reflection with hands-on making offers both techniques and a vocabulary for unconventional textile design while providing a method to critically examine production systems in the textile industry.