FASHION-ABLE

Customising healthy clothing, footwear and orthotics

for people with special needs

Fashion-able project is co-funded by the European

Commission 7th Framework Programme for Research
and Technological Development in the area High tech
solutions in production for healthy consumer goods.
The Consortium coordinated by Instituto de Biomecnica de Valencia (Spain) includes 14 partners from
different European countries.

Enabling fashion
Personalised wearable goods
are at the center of Fashionable project. These goods
address special needs of consumers who are not satisfied by
mass-produced goods in terms
of health-support, performance
and style!
Fashion-able project provides
innovative European SMEs with
technologies for co-design and
manufacturing of personalised
orthotics, clothing and footwear for people with special
needs.

Why customised goods?

Many companies offer products adapted to wheelchair users.
However, adaptations take into account mainly anthropometric
measures and do not cover other relevant functional aspects,
like thermal comfort, insulation and perspiration, pressure
distribution or adaptation to users movements. Trully personalised products should be focused on both functional and
aesthetical aspects.
An ample range of footwear products for diabetics is also already available, however deeper customisation can be extended to materials, thermal comfort, blood-pressure distribution
(comfort for diabetics).
Orthotics are produced by many manufacturers, but generally
without considering each individuals body shape. For fit and
comfort there is still plenty of room for improvement.

Understanding the needs

People that can dress/undress themselves
100%
90%

% of People

80%
70%
Paraplegics
Tetraplegics
Other

60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%

Upper body
garments

Low body
garments

Underwear

Shoes

The users needs and requirements for

clothing, footwear and textile-based
orthotics were defined at the first stage
of the project. This was achieved working with focus groups, interviews and
questionnaires carried out with medical
advisors, orthotics technicians, podiatrists and end-users across Europe.

Diabetic
Patients

Orthopaedic centre

Footwear
manufacturer

Footwear
specications

Health
Professionals
Diagnosis

Design of the footwear

Trials

Prescription

Manufacturing
OK?

NO
YES

Denitive footwear

The current purchasing process of personalised footwear for people with diabetes.

What we develop
Fashionable clothing for wheelchair users
Customised shoes for feet shape altered by illness
High-performing textile compression bandages

How we do it
On-line tools for people to customise wearable goods,
produced on-demand (co-design via the internet)
New IT tools for SMEs to produce on-demand and for
special needs
Innovative processes and materials: stretch-leather,
3D-spacer fabric, textile finishing, flexible manufacturing process and machinery

What we achieved
Made-to-measure shirts for athletes
In February 2014, the Fashion-able project
participated in the 2nd Forum of Innovation
Adapted Fashion in Elxleben, Germany. Dieter
Stellmach (DITF) and Gaby Ratajczak (Bivolino)
showed the projects results for configuration
of made-to-measure shirts for wheelchair users
and for dedicated orthotics.
Meanwhile, the shirt test campaign was
initiated with tetra- and paraplegic wheelchair
athletes from the Belgian Paralympic rugby
team, the Polish Archery Olympic team and
the basketball team Oettinger RSB Team
Thringen. Several teams members configured their individual made-to-measure shirts
with Fashion-able tools. One of the project
partners, Bivolino produced them.

What we achieved
New technique to produce footwear for diabetics
The method of footwear production for diabetics developed in Fashionable uses 3D scan technology. The feet are scanned in the orthopaedic
shop and the practitioner can add landmarks in the 3D model and mark
areas with ulcers or other specific problems. This allows selecting different models and configuring the aesthetics of the shoe.
With this information the manufacturer customises the footwear and
selects the best materials for different areas (e.g. antibacterial finishing
for areas with ulcers). Thus, the footwear is customised not only in view
of the form, but also with materials adapted to specific health problems.

What we achieved
Individual textile orthosis using 3D avatar
Fashion-able has developed a new process for individual construction of textile orthosis. Based on 3D scanning of the customer in the orthotics shop, individual body dimensions are used
to automatically generate the pattern of the orthosis. Additional
information about health conditions and fashion preferences is
collected by a product configurator. This personalised data will
finally define the individual textile orthosis.
The practitioner can obtain a 3D preview of the configured product on the 3D body scan in order to adapt the orthosis to the customers needs. Thanks to Fashion-able project it is now possible
to produce these personally designed products cost efficiently in
an industrial set up.
In this way, the customers receive a well-priced product adapted
to their anthropometry, health problems and style preferences.

Who we are
Instituto de Biomecnica de Valencia (Spain), Coordinator
Italian Converter S.r.l. (Italy)

Calzamedi S.L (Spain)

Doulou N.V. (Belgium)

BSN Medical GmbH (Germany)
J.G. Knopfs Sohn GmbH & Co. KG (Germany)
Synesis (Italy)
Athens Technology Center S.A. (Greece)
Human Solutions GmbH (Germany)
The European Apparel and Textile Confederation (Belgium)
Deutsche Institute fuer Textil- und Faserforschung Denkendorf (Germany)
Istituto di Tecnologie Industriali e Automazione (Italy)
Confederacin Plataforma Representativa Estatal de Discapacitados Fsicos (Spain)
Oglnopolska Federacja Organizacji Osb Niesprawnych Ruchowo (Poland)

More information:
www. Fashionable-project.eu
Juan V. Dura Gil
Juan.dura@ibv.upv.es

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This project has received funding from the European Unions Seventh Framework Programme for
research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 284871