Textile Futures Research Centre

To summarise what it is, the textiles futures research centre is a group of experienced designers and researchers who pursue a more sustainable way of producing materials and textiles for the future. 

The researchers are a community which consists of  PhD researchers, Post graduate and under-graduate textiles students, who all participate at one of specialist research centres   which are based at the two design colleges in the UK; Central Saint Martins and Chelsea and also The University of Arts London (UAL). It is here where their research is performed with the shared final vision of a sustainable textile futures.

The researchers drift between the three different stages which the TFRC examine future materials, these stages are:- science and technology,sustainable strategy, and well-being and social innovation. Researchers can drift between different projects extending their knowledge and striving to develop more understanding on the future of sustainable materials.

TRFC has a breadth of resources and experience in the development and usage of textiles and materials based research projects. They work with people in the various stages of education and also in collaboration with other companies, for example TFRC offer consultancy services, which involves trend briefing, Product development prototyping and sampling, sponsering student projects, knowledge transfer partnerships and contract research. They also offer Research as collaborations with other companies/ clients, giving them access to conducting research that is considered too far out to be viable.

Examples of some of the projects they have done:
"Harnessing Nano-Technology to combat climate change

Using a multi-disciplinary approach to design effective adaptation solutions for the built environment

• This is a collaborative project between; Stanton William, Atelier Ten, Nanoforce and Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. 
• The Focus here was to use the new Central Saint Martins Campus in London to explore the potential retrofitting of high performance and nano materials to help combat the effect of climate change, in this case, help reduce the effect of hotter summers. 
• Increased temperature will impact on the passive cooling capacity of the building, and the team explored emergent nano technologies that could be adapted and further developed into materials for the built environment for the years 2030 and beyond.http://www.tfrc.org.uk/research/harnessing-nanotechnology-to-combat-climate-change/)

Textiles Futures Research Centre. (N.D.) Harnessing Nano-Technology to combat climate change. Retrieved  From: http://www.tfrc.org.uk

What I particularly like about the above project is the environmental impact of it. Protecting the environment from the effects of climate change via the use of technological materials which will help in the effect of keeping buildings cooler in the hotter summers.
I think the Textiles Futures Research Centres is a great community who are involved in both the futures of textile materials in all aspect of fashion and textiles and who enable other companies to also share an interest and perform research on the concept and idea of future materials.