U EXPRESSED

Abstract: Life at a music festival can be both a blessing and a curse. It creates a feeling of escaping reality into euphoric happiness and freedom that only music festivals can bring. But one thing can drastically change this mood and make the living at the festival quite miserable – the weather. Rain as well as too high or low temperatures contribute to this negative change of mood. The festival chosen for this project was Roskilde and the month when it takes place is one of the hottest but also most rainy of the year. This is what the U Expressed project is a response to. The core is the area of the body which is most important to protect, which lead us to the brief – Erase the visitors’ mood dips at Roskilde festival by protecting the core from rain and maintaining a pleasant body temperature throughout the day. This lead us into the area of jackets. Studying the festival life made us realize that choosing right clothes can be quite problematic. You might decide to bring the jacket to the concert, and have to struggle with it being tied around your waist for most of the day. Or, you trust in the sun and leave it behind, having to regret it when it gets colder. We decided to make a jacket that people could wear throughout the day. Looking into the market, we saw that most jackets are designed to be either functional or fashionable, but not both. It was time to fool the vain visitors into buying something useful. To achieve this, we created a unisex jacket which at first sight breathes fashion but has hidden functions. An element of surprise, which is what festivals are all about. The U Expressed Jacket with its black micro suede and upper front and back covered in silver sequins, has a bold, yet minimalistic design. It consists of three layers - A water repellant outer layer, a light insulating middle layer and an inner layer which transports moisture away from the skin. But what makes this jacket unique is the function of the sequins. By pulling two straps at the front, the sequins tilt upwards, showing off the colorful backside of the sequins and allows hot air to leave the body through small ventilation holes underneath. When you are getting cold, you just pull the straps placed in the pocket and at the back, and the sequins close again, keeping the warmth inside. As far as our research shows, this technique has never been used on clothes before. We had the possibility to explore something new, that could be developed further, both by making the function more neat and by applying it to other garments. This project was a challenge for us which we are glad we accepted.