Cair Collective provides a tech-assisted dressing experience that goes beyond a single user. We make clothing items rise onto the body by building inflatable components into garments.
I collaborated with Claudia Poh (Parsons 18’) and Christina Mallon (Communications Manager). We were selected for the Hugo Boss Scholarship Award, AARP Social Innovation Award, Parsons Class of 2018 Designer of the Year for Social Innovation and the Lane Crawford Luxarity Grant.
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Cair Collective considers a paradigm where air is used to create a more automatic means of dress. In fashion, this might seem bizarre, but other fields are looking at self-driving cars and artificial intelligence. Cair Collective seeks a tech-assisted dressing experience for everyone.
By placing a human at the core of our process, we innovate and discover new clothing applications. These new ways of dressing can go beyond a single user, pushing us to reconsider the future of fashion.
While skirts and dresses are easier to put on, pants offer more coverage without compromising Christina’s modesty. This was important as she used her feet as proxies for her hands.
While we’ve introduced a future-forward system of inflatable pants, we also designed hacks into fitted sweaters, tops and elastic pants to create a full dressing system.
While we’ve introduced a future-forward system of inflatable pants, we also designed hacks into fitted sweaters, tops and elastic pants to create a full dressing system.
We relied heavily on primary research to develop our prototypes. This included filming and working closely with Christina throughout her day. As a result, we learned of certain hacks that Christina had already implemented in her everyday life, which was extremely helpful in helping us understand ways to maximize her mobility and dexterity.
One such example includes the addition of long loops onto zippers in order for Christina to unzip her jacket using her feet. This motion later triggered a similar idea of designing a band into the hem of a fitted t-shirt, as it often gets caught above the chest. The band is aligned along the hem and acts as an extended loop for Christina to reach with her toes. We’ve also built in bra cups, to combine steps within Christina’s system of dress.
