The Future of Textiles Sourcing: exploring the potential for digital tools

Textile selection involves aspects of objective function and subjective experience. While technical assessments of textiles are extensively supported by standards and machinery that provide the industry with rigorous specifications, the more subjective characteristics remain heavily reliant on designers’ tacit knowledge, experience and intuition. In this paper we present a study that investigated designers’ textile sourcing activities and if and how digital tools could provide support. The study was conducted in a textile fair with an expert audience in the mind-set of sourcing. An existing digital tool that allows textiles manipulation was introduced to familiarise participants with the digital context and enable conversations on the future of textiles sourcing. We also look at the implications of adopting digital tools for their activities including a transition to more sustainable practices. The results raise awareness of designers use experiential information to support textiles sourcing, besides highlighting requirements for designing future digital tools.