Textiles in Sweden

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On to Sweden! Doesn't seem so far off does it, Denmark-Sweden? But when you're coming Vancouver->Brazil->Copenhagen->France->Sweden, it is a long way. So, Sweden. Sweden was again, another amazing experience that I would love to do over, but on its own, without the madness of the travel and work surrounding it. Unfortunately, nothing stayed in my head, and I learned loads of amazing things. Sweden was a textile summer camp - imagine, people who make your clothing, like literally make the fabric; knowing about electronics and sewing this into your clothing. Combine this with people who study the same subject for three years becoming experts on it - electroplating, painting with graphite, working with thermochromatic ink - and then all of them give their own lesson on what they do. It was incredible! Except that I've forgotten it all because my head was so full at that point that nothing stuck. Sadness.

What I can tell you was that the people I met and the week was truly inspiring - and frightening. All of a sudden, I wasn't the cool geek girl, I was in amongst 20 girls who were way, way cooler than me. They not only were geek girls, they were also fashion girls, fabric girls, knitting, sewing, painting girls. They came from all over the world and brought with them loads of experience. It wasn't all girls though, there was one solitary guy - my good friend Rasmus who managed to create some fantastic pieces of interactive clothing while we were there.

A few things stuck out in my mind - first, the amazing concept of basic research. Now, Dzl has done this professionally for years, I'm not new to it, but I don't understand what he does. I understood what these people do and I was jealous - jealous that I don't have a)the time or b)the attention span to do what they do. One girl who has a website of endless knowledge: http://web.media.mit.edu/~plusea/ the ever inspiring Hannah, has worked to create a database of basic experiments with tons of different materials, she explores what's possible in all sorts of different methods and materials and tests anything she thinks is interesting - which is a lot of different things! It was so interesting to learn from her and see her way of thinking, especially since she's rather famous in the geek world for providing awesome online examples of how to do this and that. I also met some of the people behind V2 - a lab in Rotterdam (Netherlands) where they've made some fun pieces like the see-thru-me shirt from Meg Grant: http://www.meggrant.com/

So thank you to everyone in Boras, - also of note, this small city where we stayed in a textile factory and were told about the history of the city and textiles in this part of Sweden and how it all came to be, it was really fascinating and interesting to see all the old machines and everything.

Some photos of the week are here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/geekphysical/sets/72157626961503398/

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