Smart Second Skin and Scent Whisper at Siggraph 2005

The annual Cyber Fashion Show was hosted by Psymbiote, the technology-clad cyborg and produced by Charmed Technology. The show featured a variety of wearable computers, head-mounted displays, smart clothes, luminous clothing and accessories, futuristic club wear, and CAD/CAM jewellery and bodywear. It also featured contributions from the Banff New Media Institute, the MIT Media Lab, WIN Wearable Fashion Group, ViewStation, (whisper research group), the Wearable Fashion Group at Keio University, SONY CSL Paris, The Innovation Centre @ Central St. Martin's College of Art and Design, CuteCircuit, eMagin, Elise Co, Tina Gonsalves, Laura Bardier, and a number of other experimental artists, progressive designers, and hi-tech corporations. The wide-ranging selection of products, innovative prototypes, and unique creations projected the future realms of body-technology assimilation.

Scent Whisper

‘Scent Whisper’ is a wireless jewellery set inspired by the comic hero Spiderman. It can be worn by two people and works by the first user whispering a secret into the spider’s abdomen which has a humidity sensor embedded in a brooch. A message is ‘scent by a wireless web’ to a the second user wearing a wireless bombardier beetle brooch. The beetle brooch retaliates by spraying a scent (or poison) to a lover (or enemy) dependent upon the response from the humidity sensor embedded in the spider. This jewellery device is able to dispense airborne nano-litre sized droplets of fragrance at about 20,000 droplets per second using lab-on-a-chip technology that allows efficient scent delivery

SmartSecondSkin

The SmartSecondSkin Dress is a conceptual garment that concentrates on a more active approach to fashion offering direct life-enhancing and analgesic assistance through different mechanisms’ whilst soothing, stimulating, motivating or invigorating the wearer.

The dress demonstrates a new way to deliver fragrances for health, wellbeing and stress-reduction. It mimics the human body, in particular the circulation and nervous system, senses and scent glands. The dress interacts with human emotions whereby the aroma dimension is an integral part of the wearer’s sensory experience. It is made from two layers of while organza silk with medical tubes in-between, containing coloured liquid that demonstrate a selection of different fragrances embedded within the garment. The fragrances are diffused depending on the different moods and emotions of the user. The tubes represent an “aroma rainbow”, so that the fabric gives the impression it is creating an olfactory experience.

The fundamental advantage is the use of body sensors to determine ‘colour therapeutic’ scent release when a person is stressed, with the ability to shield a ‘Scentient Being’ (the user) from a negative mood they should be protected from. The benefits are for everyone, as recent research shows that fragrance has a positive effect on brain activity to improve mental and physical health. The dress therefore enhances mental and physical well-being, whilst acting as a medium for communicating thoughts or emotions through smell, our most ancient and primitive sense.

• http://www.psymbiote.org/cyfash/2005/
• http://www.siggraph.org/s2005/main.php?f...
• http://rhizome.org/discuss/view/18187/