Three-Dimensional Quantification of Foundation Garment s Shaping Effects

Abstract

Fashion garments sculpt the human body according to the up-to-date style. Foundation garments used to be out of whalebone and stiff materials. Nowadays thin and light shapewear aims to smooth obvious subcutaneous fat. Material, pattern, fit and formability of the body tissue influence the effect of shapewear. Thus, it is not known how much or even if shaping garments effect the body form. Moreover, there is a lack of standardized methods to analyze shaping effects of foundation garments. Up to now research focused two paths to analyze the functionality of shaping garment. First was to quantify the pressure applied, second was to measure the body changes achieved by the products. Governmental funded research project “Shaping Effects” aims to combine and pursue the research approaches. Project term is two years starting from April 2017. Therefore, most of the work is ongoing. The following presents preliminary results. 41 shapewear products were tested with HOSY apparatus to measure pressure gradient. PicoPress device was utilized to determine pressure between garment and manikin or human body respectively. 3D-analysis based on before and after scans was performed to measure changes in body geometry. Two test subjects tested shaping garments so far. Test methods were processed successfully. First results underlined the influence of material properties, body geometry and body tissue on shaping effects.