Abstract
Innovations in smart textiles technology are on the rise with a promise to add value to the consumer's life (Goodman et al., 2018). However, these innovations and the high development speed involved also raised concerns about environmental issues related to these trends (van der Velden, Kuusk, & Köhler, 2015). Therefore, TTorch project was created to bring different fields like electronics and textile engineering together to create a kit for educational purposes and follow circular economy principles during the process. TTorch is a creative toy with a development kit for up to 10-year-old children, using e-textile principles. The product kit creates a bridge between engineering and design, by letting the user explore a personal light source and build surroundings to it. The goal of the project is to show how interdisciplinary fields can work together and with that creating different opportunities. This paper gives a short overview of e-textiles, research on e- waste, textile waste and e-textile waste management. Further on it will focus on the necessary collaboration between design, engineering and industry by emphasising difference between core team and network around the core team. The collaboration aims to create an ecological product kit for educational purposes following the concept of STEAM. Discussions will include how collaboration between team members with diverse backgrounds, and their surrounding network was necessary to identify the specific gap in the market and to evolve the idea from product to development kit.
Keywords
E-Textile; Education; Collaboration; Design; Sustainability
DOI
https://10.21606/eksig2019.110
Citation
Veske, P.,and Scholz, B.(2019) Sustainability Principles through Educational E-Textile Kit, in Nithikul Nimkulrat, Kristi Kuusk, Julia Valle Noronha, Camilla Groth and Oscar Tomico (eds.), Knowing Together – experiential knowledge and collaboration, 23–24 September 2019, Tallinn, Estonia. https://doi.org/10.21606/eksig2019.110
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Sustainability Principles through Educational E-Textile Kit
Innovations in smart textiles technology are on the rise with a promise to add value to the consumer's life (Goodman et al., 2018). However, these innovations and the high development speed involved also raised concerns about environmental issues related to these trends (van der Velden, Kuusk, & Köhler, 2015). Therefore, TTorch project was created to bring different fields like electronics and textile engineering together to create a kit for educational purposes and follow circular economy principles during the process. TTorch is a creative toy with a development kit for up to 10-year-old children, using e-textile principles. The product kit creates a bridge between engineering and design, by letting the user explore a personal light source and build surroundings to it. The goal of the project is to show how interdisciplinary fields can work together and with that creating different opportunities. This paper gives a short overview of e-textiles, research on e- waste, textile waste and e-textile waste management. Further on it will focus on the necessary collaboration between design, engineering and industry by emphasising difference between core team and network around the core team. The collaboration aims to create an ecological product kit for educational purposes following the concept of STEAM. Discussions will include how collaboration between team members with diverse backgrounds, and their surrounding network was necessary to identify the specific gap in the market and to evolve the idea from product to development kit.