Electric Threads

Leah Buechley blends her knowledge of electronics, programming and sewing to create e-textiles that blink, flash and buzz.

"Artistic and scientific engineering concerns have never seemed that far apart to me. It takes similar creativity to innovate in design and technology. All of this leads to the greater personalization that people are so hungry for."

—Leah Bueckley

Leah Buechley’s research explores the intersection of computational and physical media, focusing on computational textiles or electronic textiles (e-textiles) — soft, flexible, fabric-based computers. Her work in e-textiles includes developing a method for creating cloth printed circuit boards (fabric PCBs) and designing the commercially-available lilypad arduino system, which enables novices to build soft wearable computers. Her undergraduate degree in physics is from Skidmore College where she also studied theater, dance and photography. She holds a ph.D. in computer science from the University of Colorado, Boulder and, as of January 2009, Buechley is an assistant professor in the Media Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

In this exhibit, you will learn how art and science are both integral to her work. Leah’s collaborative spirit will come through as will her commitment to demystifying the tools of programming so that others may also create computational textile projects. You will see a display of some of her work. You will see the materials and equipment needed to construct the clothing, including sketches, samples of her programming language, sewing machine, conductive thread, soldering iron, soldering flux and lilypad arudino components. One of the main ideas behind Buechley’s work is to make creating with computers and textiles accessible to others, so here you will see photos and quotes from other designers who have used Buechley’s technology in making their own computational textile creations.

Buechley became fascinated with the technical and artistic potential of conductive threads fabric. She thought it was utterly magical that it was possible to combine the hard, square universe of electronics and computers with the soft, colorful universe of textiles and fashion. Buechley has been inspired by Maggie Orth, one of the founders of the electronic textile field — her works include musical instruments made from soft embroidered pillows, textile wall-hangings that change color in response to different stimuli, and some of the first beautiful and truly wearable computers.