WINT design lab co-creates lamp that changes brightness by pressing the stretchable textile

A touch-sensitive lamp changes brightness and color temperature when users press or stretch a stretchable textile surface. Galinstan liquid metal is dispensed into pathways within knitted fabric so the metal flows and deforms with fabric stretch. Changes in pathway shape are detected and translated into adjustments of lamp temperature and brightness. Liquid Metal Dispensing technology enabled embedding conductive channels into custom yarns and alternating knit patterns marked interactive zones by texture. A round textile disc is tensioned inside a frame with four distinct touch areas that control different light settings. Researchers spent about one year refining the manufacturing method to reliably place liquid metal in fabric for product use.

WINT Design Lab and the Fraunhofer IZM team up to produce a lamp that can change its brightness as the user presses onto the surface's stretchable textile. Forming part of the research Soft Interfaces, the touch-sensitive light accessory contains a liquid metal called Galinstan embedded into the fabric. Here, the metal flows through pathways inside the textile, so when users stretch the fabric, these paths change shape, and the system reads the movement and adjusts the temperature and brightness of the lamp with stretchable textile.

The research team used Liquid Metal Dispensing technology to place the metal inside fabric. They note that this kind of process has not been used in a product before. The team - which includes Lukas Werft and Christian Dils from Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration IZM, as well as Robin Hoske and Felix Rasehorn from WINT Design Lab - spent one year developing the manufacturing method before they were able to produce a touch-sensitive lamp that uses liquid metal and stretchable textile to operate.

For the lamp, it is Case Studies, a Berlin knit design studio, that created the stretchable textile and other materials that WINT Design Lab and the Fraunhofer IZM used. The design studio made custom yarns for the project, making the fabric with alternating knit patterns to mark touch areas. In this way, the different surface textures help users feel the interactive zones. The textile disc is measured as a round screen, while the fabric sits inside a frame that keeps it stretched tight.

Read at designboom | architecture & design magazine