BETWEEN YARNS AND ELECTRONS: A METHOD FOR DESIGNING TEXTURAL EXPRESSIONS IN ELECTROMAGNETIC SMART TEXTILES

Abstract

The design of smart textiles presents a discrepancy of scale where the designer works at the level of structural textile design while facets of the material express at scales beyond one’s senses. Without methods to narrow this gap, certain expressional domains of the textile are closed off from design possibilities. The aim of the research has been to design a method for observing, visualizing, and describing expressions of electromagnetism in textiles. Through a method of textile surface scanning, one can produce a visualization of its electromagnetic field. Woven textile samples observed through this method reveal a textural quality that exists within the electron flow – an electromagnetic texture, which emerges at the intersection of woven design and electromagnetic domain variables. The design variables field strength, diffusion, and field shape contribute in narrowing the gap that presents when one designs simultaneously at the scale of textile structure and electron flow in yarns.