In an era of increasingly available digital resources, many textile designers and makers find themselves at an interesting juncture between traditional craft processes and newer digital technologies. Highly specialized craft/design practitioners may now elect to make use of digital processes in their work, but often choose not to abandon craft skills fundamental to their practice, and aim to balance the complex connection between craft and digital processes. The essays collected here consider this transition from the viewpoint of aesthetic opportunity arising in the textile designer's hands-on experimentation with material and digital technologies available in the present.
Craft provides the foundations for thinking within the design and production of textiles, and as such may provide some clues in the transition to creative and thoughtful use of current and future digital technologies. Within the framework of current challenges relating to sustainable development, globalization, and economic constraints it is important to interrogate and question how we might go about using established and emerging technologies in textiles in a positive manner.
Kane, Faith: - Faith Kane is a lecturer in Textiles and leader of the Textiles Research Group at The School of the Arts. After gaining her PhD, Designing Nonwovens: Industrial and Craft Perspectives, she taught constructed textiles at De Montfort University in Leicester, leaving in 2008 to take up her current position at Loughborough. Her current interests revolve around sustainable materials design and in particular the role and value of craft knowledge within this area. She is involved in her own practice-led research as well as the development of collaborative research projects and events. Current projects include 'Laser Enhanced Biotechnology for Textile Design' and 'Textile Thinking for Sustainable Materials'.
Nimkulrat, Nithikul: - Nithikul Nimkulrat is the Professor and Head of Department of Textile Design at the Estonian Academy of Art, Estonia. Previously a Lecturer in Textiles and a member of the Textile Research Group (TRG) at the Loughborough University, she is also a practicing textile artist and designer. Her research interest is rooted in her textile practice, reaching across conceptual issues in art and design, especially the role of creative practice in academic research and the immateriality of physical materials in creative processes.
Walton, Kerry: - Kerry Walton is the Programme Director for Textiles: Innovation and Design, School of the Arts, Loughborough University. Kerry completed a Master's degree at the Royal College of Art in 1981 and worked for a number of years as a free-lance woven textile designer and maker, exhibiting and selling through trade shows and galleries in Europe and the USA. Research interests include practice based design influenced by research on new materials and innovations in Textiles, and she has produced design collections for exhibition at the Indigo Trade Fair in Paris. Recent Research Activity includes a Materials and Design Exchange (Technology Strategy Board funded) SPARK award in collaboration with Heritage Cashmere (Halifax) manufacturer of cashmere products for a global market, for the development of innovative laser-processed designs.
