The design and creation of tactile knitted e-Textiles for interactive applications

Abstract

E-Textiles have the potential to be utilised for their tactile qualities, particularly in sensory stimulation applications. However, tactility and aesthetics are seldomly a focus of e-Textiles research, as e-Textiles research often concentrates on the functional aspects. While there is research in textiles and e-Textiles for sensory stimulation, the research rarely takes advantage of textiles production technologies, frequently using handcraft to produce the sensory tools. While these techniques are accessible, they lack scalability, making creating e-Textiles for interactive applications less practical. My work focuses on the design of tactile e-Textiles, leveraging the benefits of knit technologies in the production of e-Textiles. The work aims to produce a range of knitted textile-based e-Textiles which balance design aesthetics, functionality and ease of production. This paper outlines the research that has already been conducted, as well as the planned future work as part of this PhD research.