Project Your Emotions Onto Someone Else's Sleeve

When SwiftKey looked at emoji use for their 2015 “Emoji Report,” they found that hearts are the third most popular emoji category, right after sad faces and happy faces. Now, instead of texting one of those characters to your significant other to let them know that you love or miss them, you can up the ante by projecting your emotions on their sleeve. 

Connected Wear, a jacket designed by the Chinese company Rapido, connects to an app on your phone that enables users to send jacket-wearing friends and significant others messages. But rather than appearing on the phone, they’ll show up on the recipient’s jacket sleeve, glowing brightly for the world to see.

For example, sending “I love you” makes a pixalized heart appear, sending “I miss you” projects a falling tear, and typing in “good night” causes bursting stars to appear. App users can also send colors by using the jacket cuff to scan a shade and message it to a fellow Connected Wear buddy.

PSFK reported that in China, “more than 1500 people have applied to try out Connected Wear” and the product’s related videos have garnered over three million views on China’s YouTube equivalent, Youku.

Rapido’s goal is to create clothing “for our souls,” not just as a means to cover up the body.  And like the heartbeat app on the Apple Watch, the jacket acts as a check-in, an alternative to saying the obvious with words.

[h/t PSFK]