Home appliance manufacturer AEG has launched a 45-minute documentary called The Next Black focused on the future of clothing, with the goal to anticipate what washing needs are likely to look like down the road.
Featuring interviews with representatives from heavyweight brands such as adidas through to Patagonia, the film looks to understand what people will be wearing and washing totay and tomorrow, and how the industry can become more sustainable in doing so. It was produced together with production company House of Radon.
It also stars tech-clothing company, Studio XO; Biocouture, a consultancy exploring living organisms to grow clothing and accessories, and Yeh Group, which is pioneering a new way to dye clothes using zero water.
“We talked to designers, innovators and leaders from around the globe – people who are rethinking the way we use clothes. They have a fresh look for the future and are using their passions to fuel change. It’s not just about what we will be wearing but how we produce clothes, how we interact with them and how we care for them,” reads the write-up from AEG.
The content touches on such developments as Lady Gaga’s bubble dress; monitoring an athlete’s performance via their clothing in real-time; and materials grown in a bath tub out of bacteria.
Nancy Tilbury of Studio XO refers to her work during the interview as design engineering that just happens to be dressed up as fashion. “Philosophically as a project we’re really keen to tell people about this transformation in textiles,” she says, demonstrating how coding is being combined with clothing to bring about a fun, playful and curious result that is tranforming the way we dress.
Suzanne Lee of BioCouture meanwhile looks at how the most radical of future innovations could be organic, outlining her process for creating textiles as much closer to brewing beer or making food. The next step, she says, is taking such ideas and concepts from the lab to the market.
Imagining the future is exactly what this film sets out to do, check it out below…
fashion and mash 
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