When most people think of wearables, they think Google Glass, but there’s a lot more to Wearable Tech than people running around with devices on their heads that make them look like… explorers.
New York City is one of the capitals of the fashion world. We know that the city is a leader in Fashion Tech, but what about wearables? It’s definitely a different beast, but more and more, we’re seeing designers focusing on this exploding vertical.
Here are 21 still early adopters you should know. The makers and the promoters; the trend-setters and the trend-watchers. Our home-grown innovators, all based you-know-where.
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE 21 NEW YORKERS IN WEARABLE WHO YOU NEED TO KNOW
Founder’s note: AlleyWatch does not have a financial relationship with any of those included. This list is in no particular order nor is it a ranking. In fact, the =RAND() function on excel was used to determine order.
Christina Mercando
Ringly
Christina Mercando is the founder and CEO of Ringly, a smart piece of jewelry – specifically, a ring, of course – that helps you stay connected, in style. It connects with your phone to let you know about messages, calls, etc. that are coming in.
This is one of the smallest wearables out there, and will integrate with 20 different apps, including Uber and calendar alerts, so that if/when you’re in a meeting and have to be somewhere else soon, it’ll let you know that you have to start wrapping it up. The charge lasts for two to three days, depending on how popular you are, and the ringly box itself is the recharger.
It’s simplicity. It’s fashionable. And it has a nice ring to it.
Keep up with Christina:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Paul Farkas
Accessory 2; Wearable Wednesday NY
Paul Farkas cofounded accessory-driven agency Accessory2, focused on fashion and media placements, collabs, brand strategy and marketing. From placing wearables with fashion accessories on TV segments to styling them in photo shoots, runways or red carpet spots, his focus is curating and integrating luxury tech with high fashionable lifestyle.
He is also the founder of Wearable Wednesday NYC, affiliated with SF-based Wearable World, which regularly hosts leading wearable tech and media thought-leader events at premier venues across the city.
Like many lovers of wearable, he’s got some cool stuff planned in the broader IOT realm too.
Keep up with Paul:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Accessory Agenda Media
Jenny Fielding
R/GA Techstars
Jenny Fielding is the Managing Director of R/GA Techstars NYC Connected Devices. She recently stepped into the role, and will leverage and build on her experiences of running ventures for the BBC Worldwide and founding Labs, an accelerator focused on the intersection of media and technology. The focus is on the Internet of Things – and one of those things is wearables.
Keep up with Jenny:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Twitter
Billie Whitehouse
Wearable Experiments
So, why has Billie Whitehouse been called the Elon Musk of Wearables? The Wearable Experiments founder is on a mission is to bring together fashion and technology with a functional design aesthetic, and use creative problem solving to help us live well and have a better quality of life. She’s also on a mission to develop wearable technology that’s waterproof, durable and above all, design focused.
We’re with that.
Example: The ‘Alert Shirt,’ is fan jersey that uses wearable technology to enable fans to feel what the players feel live as it happens during the game. Or ‘New York Navigate,’ a GPS jacket that nudges the wearer to direct them left or right, so wearers can walk the city sans map or app.
Whitehouse is the company’s designer. Cofounder Ben Moir handles the tech side.
Did we mention Fundawear? It’s the world’s first wearable technology that keeps couples, um, close, by allowing personal touch to be transferred from a smartphone app to a partner anywhere in the world.
Which kind of gives new meaning to the term, ‘dialed in.’
Keep up with Billie:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Blog
Image credit: Vimeo
Drew Austin
Augmate
Drew Austin is the cofounder of Augmate, an enterprise platform that provides the building blocks to create customizable and scalable smart eyewear business applications for deskless workers. Let’s just say that they make smart glasses even smarter.
He’s also Managing Director, NYC, for @FounderDating and a mentor at @start_fast. He’s also an angel investor and an advisor to Augary, which makes safety applications for drivers of connected cars.
Keep up with Drew:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Loni Edwards
Empowered Bag
Armed with a degree from Harvard Law School and a lifetime love of fashion, creator Loni Edwards set out to create the ideal solution to the perpetual problem for the woman on the go – the dead cell phone.
Been there.
She immersed herself in the NYC Garment District and began designing. The result: Empowered Bag – simple, timeless and chic yet functional leather goods that seamlessly charge your phone and other portable electronic devices. The ultimate fusion of fashion and technology. Sold, American!
Keep up with Loni:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Pamela Kiernan
Ware
Pamela Kiernan is an investor, an inventor, a wealth management advisor at Merrill Lynch, and the founder of Ware, designs apparel that allows sensor access to the skin, for connected health, telemedicine, biofeedback, and sports training, so you can get your stats in real time. They are participants in The Refinery Accelerator’s Fall Class of women-led startups with a tech bias.
Keep up with Pamela:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Dan Rosenbaum
Wearable Insider
A highly respected technology journalist for more than 30 years and an award-winning writer, Dan Rosenbaum writes about wearable technology for Wearable Tech Insider, which covers new products, corporate news, and technology developments in the world of in wearable technology. Want to keep up with the latest on wearables? Rosenbaum’s got you covered.
Keep up with Dan:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Twitter
Marley Kaplan
mkThinkTank
Marley Kaplan is driven by bridging innovation in the tech sector with the marketing landscape. Through her consulting work with mkThinkTank and thought leadership contributions to noted tech publications, Kaplan creates context in trends and insights surfacing from the startup/early stage technology ecosystem to ignite innovation in the larger media landscape.
She frequently covers fashion tech and wearables.
Keep up with Marley:
LinkedIn
Pavan Bahl
OS Fashion
We’re written about him before. More than once. But it’s not easy to do a list of fashion forward people in NYC without including Pavan Bahl. Bahl is one of the centers of New York’s fashion tech world.
He’s one of the innovative thinkers and more importantly, doers, who is leading the movement of fashion into digital and has built a global community through OS Fashion, a platform that brings together a community of helpful innovators working within fashion, retail, and technology. In addition, to regular events OSFashion hosts a unique Freestyle Conference twice a year that brings in the luminaries from all over the fashion tech world.
And naturally that includes Wearables.
Keep up with Pavan:
Twitter
Linkedin
Image credit: Albert Cheung Photography
Mary Huang
Continuum
Part design label, part lab, Continuum has been a pioneer in ideas such as software based fashion collections and 3D printing, with designer/technologist Mary Huang at the helm. A former product designer at Shapeways, Huang’s lines include 3D printed shoes and jewelry.
Keep up with Mary:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Sabine Seymour
Moondial
Dr. Sabine Seymour is an entrepreneur, researcher, and curator focusing on the next generation of wearables, and the intertwining of aesthetics and function in our “second skin.” An innovator, a true visionary and a trend setter, Dr. Seymour is Professor of Fashionable Technology at the Parsons New School for Design, chairs the Rockefeller Foundation Grant-funded Computational Fashion project at Eyebeam, and is founder of Moondial, a company that designs wearables and consults on global wearable tech innovation.
Or as Seymour herself puts it, she sits at the nexus between silicon and style. No fashion tech list would be complete without wearables and one of its renowned innovators, and you haven’t gotten the full picture on wearables’ potential unless you’ve heard Dr. Seymour speak on neurofabrics and our bodies as digital systems. And if you haven’t heard her speak, you can always pick up her book Fashionable Technology: The Intersection of Design, Fashion, Science, and Technology.
Keep up with Sabine:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Fashionable Technology
Chris Grayson
Smart Jewel
Chris Grayson has been involved with wearables for a while now, first with Telepathy One, an early entrant into wearable computing. Now he’s back and launching his own line of wearable fashion: Smart Jewel by Christopher Grayson, which are connected rings and bracelets. Grayson is founder, CEO and Chief Creative Officer.
Keep up with Chris:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Twitter
Amy Vernon
Frequent speaker, networking, recovering journalist and social media diva, Amy Vernon is much sought-after for her advice on how to navigate the social web and has consulted to a wide variety of clients, from tech startups to international media organizations, on how to harness their community, develop shareable content and put in place best practices in their digital strategy.
She’s also quite frequently at the Conscience of Wearables. She has blogged for many sites, including VentureBeat, The Next Web, Network World, AlleyWatch and Discovery.com’s Parentables, and has driven literally millions of page views through her work.
Keep up with Amy:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Facebook
Margaux Guerard
MEMI
Margaux Guerard is cofounder and president at MEMI, an iPhone-compatible smartbracelet that discreetly vibrates when you receive important phone calls, text messages and calendar alerts.
In fact, it’s so discreet, it doesn’t even look like a wearable. Available for pre-order only right now.
Keep up with Margaux:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Twitter
Amanda Parkes
Manufacture NY
Dr. Amanda Parkes is a media designer and technologist interested in how digital technologies and smart materials can expand our relationship with natural phenomena to facilitate a more intuitive connection between technology and the natural world. She works with algae-based materials and is using science to create real innovation in ‘wearables.’
Besides her work at ManufactureNY, where she is Chief of Technology & Research, she is the founder of Skinteractive Studio, which develops fashion technology and hi-tech textile projects for use in areas ranging from performance to medicine. She is also the co-founder and the CTO of Bodega Algae, a company developing a modular, scalable, microalgae photobioreactor for the production of high-energy algal biomass for use in the production of biofuel.
Keep up with Amanda:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: AmandaParkes.com
Ze Xu
Weloop
Ze Xu is cofounder and CEO of Weloop, smart glasses focused on live streaming and sharing in the now. Weloop allows you to instantly live stream your point-of-view with a single button press. The glasses pair via WiFi to your mobile phone and then use your phone’s data connection to livestream.
Keep up with Ze:
LinkedIn
Image credit: LinkedIn
Liza Kindred
Third Wave Fashion
Liza Kindred helped put fashion tech on the map, and publishes a monthly report that details the current state of fashion + tech – and of course that includes wearables – one of the hottest and fastest growing segments.
In 2011, she founded Third Wave Fashion to bring her in-depth knowledge of technology to the world of fashion.
Kindred is obsessed with technology and how it’s shaping the world of fashion. So obsessed, in fact, that she sat down and wrote the book on it: The Third Wave of Commerce: How We Buy Now.
Keep up with Liza:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Third Wave Fashion
Madison Maxey
The Crated
Madison Maxey, a Thiel Fellow, is literally changing the fabric of fashion and wearables, most lately via The Crated, a design consultancy and R&D lab that uses qualitative research and a highly technical team of multi-disciplinary makers to create designs and experiences in the wide world of wearables. CRATED has consulted, tinkered, and prototyped at the intersection where object meets body.
Maxey has been featured in New York Magazine, the Wall Street Journal, Nylon Magazine, among others, and was named a “Female Founder to Watch” by Women 2.0. It was while working at General Assembly that she made it her goal to combine all things technological and fashionable, and was accepted into the Thiel Fellowship for the class of 2013. Maxey’s got moxy!
Keep up with Madison:
LinkedIn
Twitter
Image credit: MadisonMaxey.com
Dan Steingart
Princeton University
Dan Steingart is Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Andlinger Center For Energy and The Environment, Princeton University and he’s an expert on woven battery technology. Sounds like he has a good time doing what he’s doing, which is basically helping to invent the future.
Here’s what he does, in his own words: “In one hand I hold a bunch of problems, in the other a bunch of tricks, and I generally try to, in a very Edisonian manner, shove one into the other and see what works. This can be a very efficient way of getting to a novel solution, provided one is honest about the outcome.”
To date the tricks have been:
– standard printing of novel materials
– novel printing of standard materials
– novel printing of novel materials
– standard printing of standard materials
– creating small, low power, semi-autonomous computers
– a humble appreciation of electrochemistry
– looking at morphologies in change through optical, electron and xray interrogation
And the problems he has explored:
– energy sources for very large and very small devices
– understanding losses in very inefficient, distributed processes and
– putting tiny, cheap computers in (at the time) odd places
Keep up with Dan:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Princeton Lab for Electrochemical Engineering Systems Research
Uri Minkoff
Rebecca Minkoff
Uri Minkoff is CEO and founder of Rebecca Minkoff, one of fashion’s latter day icons, especially to young female hipsters. And RM may well be on her way to become an icon among the smart jewelry set with her line of bracelets that double as phone chargers, and necklaces that buzz when you’ve received an email or text message.
The company has always been fashion and tech forward, and Uri is the man (ok, he’s her brother) behind the designer.
Keep up with Uri:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Image credit: Decoded Fashion
