Knitwear Created From Your Brainwaves

This is not your grandmother's knitting: artist-duo Varvara Guljajeva and Mar Canet, and MTG researcher Sebastian Mealla have figured out a way to turn brainwaves into elaborate patterns for scarves and sweaters using simple technology. NeuroKnitting—as the collaborators call it—takes activity from a user's brain while listening to Bach's "Goldberg Variations," and translates these movements into a knitted design. To harness this technology, each participant wears a non invasive headset to measure brainwaves in various states: relaxation, excitement, and cognitive load. With music as the catalyst to induce moods, and therefore reactions, these vibrations are then sent to a knitting machine.

"Hence, every stitch of a pattern corresponds to a unique brain state stimulated by the act of listening. It means the user’s affective response to music is captured every second and memorized in the knitted garment pattern," the creators explain on their website.

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[vimeo][/vimeo]

The result is a beautiful example of what happens when art meets science, and technology meets craft. And your grandmother might even approve.

Add "learning how to sew" to your To-Do list here.