Jewelry and accessories have long been objects for decorating the human body; however they remain static and non-interactive. This work explores opportunities for accessory-like kinetic wearables and their association with individual style. We developed Kino, a kinetic accessory system which enables both aesthetic and functional clothing-specific design possibilities. We engaged both fashion designers and every-day users to unpack envisioned use cases and perceptions of the system. Participants viewed the devices not as gadgets but as companions due to their close proximity to the body. They envisioned a wide range of usage scenarios, highlighting the complexity of mobility in relation to personal style. We observe how mobility offers opportunities for fluid representations of self, which is unachievable though static clothing and accessories. We also outline how personalized aesthetics is important for the meaning making of novel on-body devices.

We introduce Rovables, a miniature robot that can move freely on unmodified clothing. The robots are held in place by magnetic wheels, and can climb vertically. The robots are untethered and have an onboard battery, microcontroller, and wireless communications. They also contain a low-power localization system that uses wheel encoders and IMU, allowing Rovables to perform limited autonomous navigation on the body. In the technical evaluations, we found that Rovables can operate continuously for 45 minutes and can carry up to 1.5N. We propose an interaction space for mobile on-body devices spanning sensing, actuation, and interfaces, and develop application scenarios in that space. Our applications include on-body sensing, modular displays, tactile feedback and interactive clothing and jewelry.

Computational thinking is an important part of a modern education, and robotics provides a powerful tool for teaching programming logic in an interactive and engaging way. The robot garden presented in this paper is a distributed multi-robot system capable of running autonomously or under user control from a simple graphical interface. Over 100 origami flowers are actuated with LEDs and printed pouch motors, and are deployed in a modular array around additional swimming and crawling folded robots. The garden integrates state-of-the-art rapid design and fabrication technologies with distributed systems software techniques to create a scalable swarm in which robots can be controlled individually or as a group. The garden can be used to teach basic algorithmic concepts through its distributed algorithm demonstration capabilities and can teach programming concepts through its education-oriented user interface.