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Researchers at Southampton University have revealed their plans to develop clothing fabric that generates electricity through wearers’ movement and body heat. At it’s current level of generation, the technology is strong enough only to power individual items such as MP3 players but could soon be developed enough to support wireless health-monitoring systems such as those used in people with sleep apnea, epileptic fits or heart conditions.
One place that it might be used once is reaches a level where it can be aggregated is universities, to power campus equipment.
In the meantime, and before your university offer depends on your electricity generating status as well as your grades, if you’re one of the lucky teens who got a university place this year, what clothing should you be packing?
• Sports socks – Not smart but warm and cosy. Worn with the ubiquitous crocs they can provide full protection against the cold and the lurking nasties to be found on communal bathroom floors.
• Jog pants – The ‘tracky’ might be low-grade but it’s ultra comforting: on days when you don’t have to appear in public, like essay deadline days, they can be what you wear from waking, through faking, to breaking and calling the campus helpline in tears.
• Hoodie – Wonderful item, practical, fashionable and totally annoying to lecturers. Don’t invest in the university shop ones though: they mark you out as a fresher and a fool because they cost about twice as much as from anywhere else.
• Beanie – Great for shoving on when you haven’t washed your hair and you don’t want to give the grunge vibe. Also good for when you decided at 2 am that it was a good idea to shave/dye/straighten your hair and it didn’t work.
The recent case of a badly sunburnt baby whose parents had kept it on Brighton beach all day in inappropriate clothing just goes to show how dangerous the sun can be. But we all want to enjoy the good weather and children in particular love to be outside when the sun shines. So how do we keep them safe?
Sunshine and clothing
People of any age, with any skin colour, can develop skin cancers but children are five times more likely to suffer sunburn and it’s sunburn that is often linked to development of melanoma skin cancer in later life. The areas where melanoma is most often seen are the face, head and shoulders: areas that can easily be protected by hats and short or long-sleeved T-shirts.
Prevention is better than cure
Try to keep children out of direct sun between eleven and three – let them sit in the shade or even, although it feels wrong, indoors watching cartoons on TV!
A good UV screening T-shirt is thick enough so that when you put your hand inside, you can’t see your skin through the fabric. Anything thinner than that doesn’t offer adequate protection. Clothing choices for children should work with a good waterproof sunscreen to offer maximum safeguard.
Hats help most
In Australia they’ve run a national campaign to encourage parents to put hats on their children. It’s claimed that a child wearing a baseball cap is 78% less likely to suffer sunstroke.
Babies belong in the shade
The latest government advice is that babies under 6 months should be kept completely out of the sun, and should not have sunscreen applied to their skin. This means that your baby should be indoors, under a parasol or – if you have to expose them to the sun – choose baby clothing that covers the entire body such as a long sleeved T-shirt and leggings with a wide-brimmed hat.
The 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver have revealed a new, sporty but coordinated, sassy yet streamlined, sense of winter fashion. Whether it’s the sportswear disguised as denim worn by Shaun White or the kooky headband of Chemmy Alcott, winter fashion is big!
It’s also cost-effective, because while the USA Olympic team has been dressed by Ralph Lauren, you can create the same vibe at home for a fraction of the price, by shopping around for casual clothing and a few key sporty items to make the outfit work for you.
To get the look for yourself …
1. Go for primary colours – red, white, blue and green are favourites. Nothing should be pale or faded, apart from denims. Bright winter jackets in yellow and green are likely to be big sellers in the next couple of weeks, as are skinny fit ringer T-shirts with contrast trims.
2. Polo shirts need to fit perfectly – too tight looks silly and too loose looks like a hockey player who’s forgotten his pads.
3. Hats are big – but their size is small – tiny beanie hats and close-fitting billed caps should be worn with winter jackets to get the look right.
4. Tight T-shirts are likely to be spring’s big hit for women: wear a skin-tight red or pink round-necked T-shirt under a white or yellow jacket to get the look that’s been turning up on the Olympic medal podiums all week.
First, know your budget and stick to it – don’t just decide how much you have to spend on clothing, because it’s easy to blow the whole amount on one cashmere sweater or a fashionable jacket. Instead, divide your budget between different forms of clothing: basic T-shirts are pretty cheap, but leather jackets are not, so allocate a percentage to every form of clothing you need to buy.
Aim for quality not quantity. Beware of very cheap clothing that simply gets worn out before you’ve worn it a few times – flimsy shirts that begin to bag and stain after a couple of wearings are not a bargain. A good quality cotton or poly-cotton shirt will last several years and can take hard washing and still look good – it’s a much better bargain than a cheap top that falls apart. Equally, try to stay way from knock-off imitations because (a) they tend to look cheaper as they generally copy a design and maybe its logo but not the quality and (b) who are you fooling? Anybody who knows you has a pretty good idea if you can really afford Armani suits or not.
Avoid posh shops and boutiques when purchasing, but use them when deciding what to buy – look at the brand name fashions in store and then go home and shop online, spotting the same trends for a fraction of the price. Also, check out the clearance offers when shopping online, discontinued items can be up 50-75% lower than the original price.
Mix and match. You can team T-shirts with blazers and shirts with cardigans to extend your wardrobe by giving your clothes a new look. You can use accessories to ring the changes too – invest in some cheap belts and gloves and hats that you can use to make your base outfit look completely different.
The coldest winter in recent history is all but behind us, and an uncertain spring looms ahead, so how can you dress to be smart, warm and comfortable?
Begin by replacing heavy sweaters and the kind of scarf that you mum knitted for you with something a little more stylish – both give you a rotund appearance that is less than flattering and don’t really allow for layering. Instead, invest in some long-sleeved T-shirts that can be worn with slim-line jackets and the new lightweight scarves that add warmth without bulk – because they are so much lighter, these scarves are still comfortable to wear in spring, especially with a sleeveless fleece. Go for hats, scarves and gloves that tone with each other, rather than a matching set, which is a little old fashioned – a pale blue hat with navy gloves and a blue and grey scarf gives the right impression without over co-ordination.
Vests are great items to layer, and can be worn over or under long sleeved T-shirts or short sleeved ones to add warmth without making you look fat. As the summer approaches, reduce your layers to a polo-shirt under a fleece or if the weather is so cold as to need long sleeves, try a sweatshirt with a knotted scarf around your neck.
Trousers for the year ahead are likely to be straight cut and often worn, by women, tucked into boots well into the spring. If you’re wearing a layered top look, stick to smart black trousers that don’t distract the eye from the complexity of the garments on your upper body.
Classic sweatshirts and polo-shirts combine to make versatile casual clothing options if your want to look good on a small income.
Worn alone a classic plain sweatshirt looks neutral and is good for almost all occasions, but you can team it with a bright T-shirt or a polo-shirt layered over the top for colder weather or to offer a contrasting appearance that is more casual.
Both polo shirts and sweatshirts can be worn with casual jackets which gives a sporty appearance or with jeans or shorts to offer a more relaxed impression. A sweatshirt is also a great accessory to tie around your shoulders or waist if you feel the weather might change and you don’t want to carry a jacket.
For men, it’s easy to choose two colours around which to base your wardrobe, such as blue and beige or black and white meaning that you can combine a white zipped hoodie with black trousers, jeans, shorts and chinos to give a range of clothing choices from semi-formal to totally casual. For women, more choice of colour is better, but picking a base colour such as navy blue around which to coordinate your clothing allows you to be sure that all your T-shirts, vests and camisoles work with all the clothing that you wear on your lower body. Smaller items, usually called clothing accessories, such as vests, belts and hats can be purchased in contrasting colours to offer variety.
Christmas now means taking more care with your appearance – your favourite T-shirt might be something you can get away with wearing as you unwrap presents in the morning, but by lunchtime you need to be dressing smart-casual, especially if you’re entertaining guests. Aim for a polo-shirt with your new Christmas scarf over the top if you’re male, or for women, a long sleeved T-shirt with a shrug over the top.
The basic rule is to make a bit more effort that you usually would but not to get carried away unless there is actually a formal event (lunch with people from outside the family, drinks party etc) planned.
For trips to the pub, or out to make snowmen, choose a sleeveless fleece that allows you to move easily without losing temperature. Because winter is a grey time, choose bright colours for outdoor wear: red, bright blue or pink are ideal, but stay away from yellow if you’re a bit hungover as alcohol can make the skin yellower and the whites of the eyes somewhat tea coloured and yellow clothing simply emphasises this. A hat and scarf help to keep you warm and can add a colour contrast to your jacket or fleece so that you don’t lose your fashion cachet when you move into outdoor wear.
There was a time when it was unfashionable to wear hats. Through the 1970s and 1980s, for some reason, men thought hats were unmasculine. Fortunately this weird behaviour has now changed and men wear both summer and winter hats. A hat that keeps your head warm in winter is important to your health and there is a wide range to choose from, the baseball cap, the hood of a hoodie, a pull-on beanie etc. Any of them will help insulate you from the winter weather.
Gloves are important if you’re going to be outdoors because they help reduce heat loss from the body but also because chilled hands do not function well. Canadian police estimate that a third of winter accidents while driving happen because the driver has cold hands and thus loses control of the wheel or over or underestimates their actions. Fleece gloves keep the hands extra warm in winter and come in a range of colours.
Scarves are not just a way of keeping your neck and chest warm, they make a fashion statement too. A winter scarf can be the easiest way to perk up a tired looking winter coat and having several in different colours allows you to match your mood to your outer clothing without having to invest in several coats or jackets.
This winter the weather has been weird: floods and gales, thunderstorms and torrential rain, and to look good in such extreme weather conditions can be difficult. The most common problems are twofold – the amount of clothing you need to wear to keep warm makes you look like a tubby, even if you’re not, and the outer clothing that keeps you dry can look like a plastic sack. Here’s how to dress for the weather and still look stylish.
1. Begin by choosing good socks and underwear – if you have warm clothing on your feet and backside, you can cut out at least one outer layer, this keeps your silhouette slimmer.
2. Sticking to the rule, light for height and low below means that you wear dark colours below the waist and lighter ones above – this suits both men and women as it makes you look slimmer from the waist down than from the waist up, which is the effect we all want to achieve! Do this by ensuring your trousers are a couple of shades darker than your jacket or hoodie. Bright white is a great colour for a jacket, sweatshirt or hoodie, especially when teamed with a contrasting scarf in something like green, grey or yellow to focus attention on the vertical line it creates against the pale background.
3. Always choose a fleece jacket or a sleeveless fleece if you want to be warm without adding bulk to your appearance – core body temperature determines if you feel toasty or shivery, so having something that keeps the chest and back insulated means you’ll feel warm without looking chunky.
4. Wear a hat – the 10% of body heat we lose through our heads can make us feel very cold, so a hat can mean you don’t need an extra layer on your upper body.
As the old advertising slogan has it, hats help. And especially in winter a hat helps you look better and actually feel better.
The old myth that most body heat is lost through the head is actually untrue – it dates back to research carried out by the US military in the 1950s when volunteers were dressed in Arctic survival suits and exposed to bitterly cold conditions. Because it was the only part of their bodies left uncovered, most of the heat did leave the head, but if they’d been dressed in shorts, only around 10% of the heat would have left the body through the head because the large area of exposed skin across the rest of the body would have caused higher heat loss.
However we do lose between 7 – 55% of body heat through our heads and a hat can prevent virtually all of that loss. It also stops some of the other effects of winter, such as cold ears which can lead to earache and hats with brims or bills can reduce the way that cold makes the eyes water, which makes us both look and feel miserable.
So it’s true is that a hat allows us to feel better in cold weather. It also protects the brain from getting chilled, which can make us feel sluggish, which is why sometimes after going out in cold weather we feel extremely drowsy and stupid, and hats can even cut down on the incidence of sinus headaches caused by inhaling cold air as hats with a brim create a micro-climate that means the warm air we breathe out doesn’t disperse so quickly so it mixes with the colder air and thus stops the sinuses starting to ache through frigid air entering them.
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