Predictive thoughts

January 23, 2023  |  My Take

In the first feature of 2023, addressing “where we’ve been and where we’re going,” our writer Marie O’Mahony pointed to supply chain issues, the increased use of automation and robotics in manufacturing, the growth of 3D printing technologies, and biotechnology advances. For our next featu…
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Sustainability: too much of a good thing?

December 12, 2022  |  My Take

For many of us who live in the U.S., the Thanksgiving holiday in November is a reason to bring folks together around the table and eat a ridiculous amount of food. Because we do this so seldom (maybe only on Thanksgiving), we enjoy it. The analogy may be a bit of a stretch, but you might also feel l…
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Shoes

November 14, 2022  |  My Take

In the world of apparel, there is nothing to compare to shoes. Some people have one pair and wear them every single day. Others have a closet full—one for every occasion and outfit. Most of us fall somewhere in between, but we all have strong opinions about shoes, and you can’t argue with me on …
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Don’t just take my word for it

October 24, 2022  |  My Take

I have an old half-zip turtleneck. I like the fit, the cut and the feel of it – even after 10 years. Yes, it’s a high-quality brand. I keep it because it’s my go-to shirt for outdoor chores at the lake. Bits of imbedded pine sap and random dirt stains are evidence of its years of experience, b…
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I could say I told you so

September 12, 2022  |  My Take

I may not live to see this happen—or to see it happen to the extent I anticipate—but I fully expect smart textiles to eventually be a meaningful part of every market in the functional fabrics industry. The transition is underway. One indicator is a name change for this online magazine and the or…
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“Acid, microbes, saltwater, perspiration, alkali, abrasion, stretch, torsion, flex endurance and washability”

August 22, 2022  |  My Take

Before automobiles, there was no reason to put up a stop sign on a country gravel road. Before there were enough children to fill a one-room school, there was no need for compulsory education. With no food processing and packaging industry, nobody needed a label to identify a sack of potatoes.
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Running out of definitions

July 25, 2022  |  My Take

Little by little we, as an industry, have expanded our view of what is a textile. Actually, many of the materials that are part of the stories we’ve run on the Advanced Textiles Source site are not “textiles” at all. Or fabric. They may not be called vinyls or even film. They are something e…
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You call that a textile?

June 9, 2022  |  My Take

It took me a while to embrace the larger industrial textiles world and get comfortable understanding them – all of them – as “textiles” (or “fabrics,” but that discussion will be for another time). What we may call traditional markets, such as awnings and canopies, tents and architectura…
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Nothing ventured, nothing gained

May 9, 2022  |  My Take

I don’t consider myself risk averse, generally, but I don’t have a burning desire to jump out of an airplane, either. I have, however, written a genre-blended book that is difficult to classify. A publisher is going to have to know how to pitch it to book sellers, who must know where to shelve i…
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Getting to know you and what you do

April 11, 2022  |  My Take

The first Smart Fabrics Summit was co-sponsored by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce and held in Washington, D.C. in April 2016. It brought together participants that typically do not talk to each other. That’s not because they don’t like each other; it was simply because they do different things and d…
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