Founded in 2004, CuteCircuit is the world’s first wearable-technology fashion brand. A pioneer in this field, CuteCircuit interweaves leading edge fashion design with emerging technologies and smart fabrics to create fashion design that not only looks beautiful, but also features magical interactive capabilities. CuteCircuit’s co-founders, Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz, come from a heritage of couture in fashion design (Valentino), and Interaction Design and Anthropology respectively.
After a decade and a half of innovation, the brand holds a number of patents in the field of wearable technology, such as 3D Spatial Audio, Haptics for Augmented Reality , Interactive Luminous Garments, Multimedia Wearable Telecommunication Devices, and Sensor Enhanced Fabric constructions.
The fashion collections presented on-schedule at New York Fashion week introduced luxury ready-to-wear fashions and accessories that can be controlled via a smartphone app to allow the wearer to change the colour and functionality of their garments at the touch of a button. CuteCircuit also recently collaborated with Chanel and Converse.
At CuteCircuit we believe that in the future our bodies will become the interface to data, and clothing will become an intelligent second skin enabling the wearers to connect with each other in a more intuitive and intimate manner.
CuteCircuit introduced internet connected clothing and touch (haptic) telecommunication with products such as the Hug Shirt in 2002 (awarded by Time magazine as one of the Best Inventions of the Year in 2006). The Galaxy Dress introduced in 2008 (part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago) remains today the world’s largest wearable luminous display and it is a truly magical and mesmerising garment.
Social media connected clothing such as the world’s first haute couture Twitter Dress was introduced in 2012. CuteCircuit also became the first fashion label to put wearable technology on the red carpet when Katy Perry wore a CuteCircuit gown to the Met Gala in 2010, and the same year CuteCircuit introduced the first line of technologically advanced ready-to-wear at Selfridges in London. The Graphene Dress, the world’s first dress made using graphene was created in 2017.
Many garments from the CuteCircuit collections are on display and in collections of museums all over the world, such as the Barbican Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Museum at FIT, etc. Currently at Cooper Hewitt the Smithsonian Design Museum in New York is the SoundShirt, a garment that allows deaf audience members to feel the music during a concert through touch sensations, on display in the Access+Ability exhibition.
The SoundShirt, was honored by Fast Company in 3 Innovation by Design categories: Fashion and Beauty, Experimental, and Social Good, and in January 2019 it was selected to be part of the annual exhibition at the World Economic Forum in Davos. In 2019 CuteCircuit received the Netexplo Innovation Award from UNESCO, and this year CuteCircuit was awarded the AUGGIE Award 2020 for Biggest Societal Impact in VR and XR.
CuteCircuit’s co-founders speak on the themes of fashion, innovation, interaction design, and wearable technology at international conferences such as CES, WEAR, WIRED NextGen, TEDx, Vogue Digital, DLD, and SXSW. In April 2020 CuteCircuit started the live broadcast series about design and innovation Live with CuteCircuit, streaming on Instagram every Friday at 4pm BST.
CuteCircuit's co-founders met at the prestigious Interaction Design Institute Ivrea, the world's first research institute dedicated to interaction design and the creation of new technologies. They started working together due to their common interest in amplifying the body's senses through technology. Prior to Ivrea Francesca worked at Valentino in Rome, and Ryan has a background in art and anthropology.
The world's first wearable haptic telecommunication garment, designed to answer the human's need for connectedness and intimacy.
Exploring augmented reality scenarios while on the move thanks to a patented pioneering tridimensional audio experience. The world's first 3D-Audio technology for truly immersive Augmented Reality.
CuteCircuit is the world's first wearable technology fashion brand, Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz are the co-founders of CuteCircuit.
The HugShirt wins the first prize in the design innovation category.
The TransforMe collection includes chameleon skirts and motion reactive evening gowns. It is featured in the Body Electric on Surface Magazine.
CuteCircuit's work is featured in Fashioning the Future by Suzanne Lee. The book gives an overview of what our tomorrow's wardrobe will look like.
The HugShirt is shown at WIRED NextFest and Time Magazine selects it as one of the best inventions of the year.
CuteCircuit opens its design and innovation headquarters in London.
CuteCircuit launches the world's first solar powered garment.
CuteCircuit launches the first motion tracking, music playing sports jacket during WIIRED NextFest in Los Angeles.
CuteCircuit launches the world's first little black dress that is also a mobile phone controlled using natural gestures.
The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago commissions the Galaxy Dress to show what the future of fashion will look like in the Fast Forward: Inventing the Future exhibition.
The HugShirt receives MWC Award from UKTI and is invited to show at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Katy Perry wears CuteCircuit to the MET Gala with the American Woman Fashioning a National Identity theme. This is the beginning of many a collaboration with Katy Perry.
Katy Perry is featured on the cover of WWD the day after the MET Gala. News papers all over the world also feature her photos starting a CuteCircuit mania worldwide.
Selfridges features an exclusive menswear and womenswear collection by CuteCircuit. This marks the first time that a wearable technology fashion brand is sold in any department store.
CuteCircuit creates two stunning haute couture garments for Laura Pausini's Inedito Tour.
CuteCircuit invents the first app controlled t-shirt that can change pattern and display photos in real-time.
The Armour ready to wear collection is shown during Paris Fashion Week.
Nicole Scherzinger wears the world's first haute couture Twitter Dress on the red carpet for the launch of the EE network in London. Fans from all over the world can share their messages on Nicole's dress.
The haute couture collection features pink and black dresses that change colour in response to fans' votes. Celebrities such as Eiza Gonzalez wear them on the red carpet to launch the haute couture Pink and Black ice-cream flavours.
For the exclusive launch of ET during American Idol, CuteCircuit creates an incredible bodysuit for Katy's performance.
CuteCircuit is featured on the cover of Women's Wear Daily for the second time.
The iMiniSkirt from the ready to wear collection features special tiger-themed imagery for the single ``Roar``.
CuteCircuit's Autumn/Winter collection is shown at New York Fashion Week. This marks the world's first runway show where all the models are in control of the design of their garment through an iPhone App.
CuteCircuit launches the world's first illuminated handbag during fashion week.
To celebrate CuteCircuit's first 10 years, we showed a retrospective haute couture collection at the Renzo Piano designed Parco della Musica auditorium in Rome.
CuteCircuit designs futuristic ground crew and cabin crew uniforms for British Airline EasyJet.
The HugShirt evolves into a SoundShirt: the first haptic garment that allows a deaf person to feel music during a concert.
The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston commissions CuteCircuit with the creation of the most advanced haute couture gown exclusively for the #TechStyle exhibition.
The latest CuteCircuit Prêt-à-Porter and Demi-Couture collections featured on the cover and a multi-page spread in Wired Magazine Special Edition about advances in fashion design and wearable technologies.
CuteCircuit collaborates with Converse to create the ultimate shoe for guitar pros.
In collaboration with the Manchester National Graphene Institute and INTU, CuteCircuit creates the world's first haute couture Graphene Dress.
CuteCircuit designs an exclusive collection of illuminated interactive handbags for Chanel's spring summer collection.
CuteCircuit's SoundShirt features in the Access+Ability exhibition at Cooper Hewitt in New York.
Fast Company’s Innovation By Design Awards celebrate trailblazing design in business. Among 16 categories, CuteCircuit’s SoundShirt was honoured in 3 categories : Experimental, Fashion and Beauty, and Social Good.
The SoundShirt 2.0 is part of the Access+Ability exhibition at the World Economic Forum. During the exhibition hundreds of participants, including those who are blind, deaf, and hard of hearing, are able to wear this full body augmented reality experience to ``feel`` the Hebrides Overture (Mendelssohn Symphony n.3) as performed by the London Symphony Orchestra.
CuteCircuit wins the UNESCO Netexplo Innovation Award 2019 for the SoundShirt. Ryan and Francesca received the award on stage in Paris after giving a live demo of the SoundShirt. Selected amongst 2500 innovations from all over the world by the Netexplo observatory. The award is a magnificent golden robot! Merci beaucoup!
The SoundShirt is the winner of the Auggie Award 2020 for Biggest Societal Impact in augmented and virtual reality. Thank you to everyone who voted for us and a special thank you to all of our partners that help us bring the experience worldwide!
CuteCircuit’s co-founders Francesca and Ryan have spoken at more than 100 conferences worldwide