On Tuesday 25th November 2022, Digital Futures welcomed speakers and attendees to the University of Manchester’s Engineering Building B for our Industry 5 event – The Future of Fashion and Textiles Manufacturing. Led by the Industry 5.0 theme lead, Professor Charlie Wang, the event featured a series of short talks and discussions with researchers and industry representatives, as well as VR/AR and live body scanning technology demonstrations.
Greater Manchester has a long history at the forefront of the fashion and textiles industry. By continuing to forge strong links between the private sector, third sector and academic capacity we can navigate new opportunities and challenges presented by the influence of human-robotic interactions in the industry across design, production and business marketing amongst other areas. This event gave us an insight into the impact of Industry 5.0 on fashion and manufacturing.
Our exciting line up of speakers shared some of the latest developments in Industry 5.0 and after lunch, Charlie Wang (Chair of Smart Manufacturing, The University of Manchester) kicked things off by introducing the event and taking us through the talks we had lined up.
Dr Simeon Gill gave the first presentation about technology as an enabler to address fit in apparel. Following this, Hujun Yin (Professor of Artificial Intelligence) presented on AI technology for the fashion Industry and Suzanne Postlethwaite (Professor of Fashion Technologies, MMU) spoke about robotics in the fashion Industry. Next up, PhD student Rachel Cox talked us through Industry 5.0 and clothing manufacturing and the impact of technology on garment workers. Anthony Payton (VR@Manchester lead) gave the final presentation of the day which focussed on the use of VR and AR in the fashion industry. Our audience also got the chance to try out some of the exciting VR equipment that Anthony bought along.
After the talks, we invited each of our speakers to join a table where attendees had the opportunity to ask questions, engage in group discussions and network. With industry attendees from organisations including Pangaia, Eurotex, English Institute of Sport and English Fine Cottons, as well as internal guests and individuals from other university’s, this was a great opportunity to connect and spark some interesting discussions.
The event was rounded up by Simeon Gill who invited attendees up to the fourth floor of the Engineering building to show them the live tailoring scanning technology that can be used to create custom garments.
Thanks again to everyone who attended and we hope to welcome you back to a Digital Futures or Sustainable Futures event soon. Click the links below to sign up to our newsletters to keep up to date with all the latest events and opportunities.