Big questions: bigger rewards

February 9, 2026  |  My Take

If I have learned one thing while working in the textiles industry, it is that innovative solutions are in the making all the time. If this industry can figure out how to make a single fiber conductive, so that a shirt can monitor vital signs 24-7, it can figure out how to make itself a friendlier p…
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Figuring it out

January 26, 2026  |  My Take

We would typically do either an end-of-year wrap up or a-look-forward-to-2026 feature in January. But this has not been a typical year. Our attention has not been allowed to land for long to contemplate the implications of an action taken by the current administration before another action pulls us …
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Protecting the protectors

December 15, 2025  |  My Take

With the proliferation of smart textiles and their new technologies and applications, one finds it relatively easy to pair almost any other topic we discuss in this publication with smart textiles in general, or e-textiles in particular.
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It’s a wrap!

November 10, 2025  |  My Take

I have been to several Advanced Textiles Association EXPOs and almost as many Emerging Textiles Conferences. The names of both have changed, but the focus on gathering the textile industry together remains the same.
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It’s what you don’t see

October 27, 2025  |  My Take

When I first decided on a topic for a “Featured” article this month, I was thinking of textiles that are part of the industry but aren’t necessarily thought of as textiles. Or textiles that are literally hidden inside other materials, as it is with some composites. Or biomedical textiles that …
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The magical realism of biomaterials

September 8, 2025  |  My Take

In writing, “magical realism” is a genre of fiction that combines realism with magical elements, but (if you’re good at this sort of writing) the magical elements seem plausible—fitting in, but blurring the lines, between what we know and what we can imagine. This, to me, is where some of to…
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The 3Rs live on

August 11, 2025  |  My Take

The phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle” came into popular use in the early 1970s and gave us a simple framework to move towards more responsible use of resources. I could write pages (I’ll bet many of you could, too) describing the many ways we can practice the “3 R’s” as individuals, in our…
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Can you define “polymer?”

July 14, 2025  |  My Take

You all know what polymers are, more or less, and some of you know way more, but what if you were asked to help someone, who doesn’t know, understand it?
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