Elizabeth Whelan Design wins top prize at FT Awards

By Fiona Haran 11 May 2017

Textiles studio Elizabeth Whelan Design took home the Launch of the Year trophy at last night’s Future Textiles Awards 2017, hosted at The Westin Grand Frankfurt, Germany. Kunal Mankodiya, of the University of Rhode Island, was named Innovator of the Year, and the team from Inuheat Group AB was successful in two separate categories.

Organised by WTiN, the third edition of the now biennial awards, which celebrate the best innovations in the technical textiles industry, was attended by more than 150 guests and saw a host of leading companies and research institutes honoured for their cutting-edge products, processes and treatments. It was held during the ongoing Techtextil and Texprocess trade fairs, which are dedicated to the latest developments in technical textiles and nonwovens.

Elizabeth Whelan Design was recognised for its Tegris-Lite Tumi luggage, which merges ballistic nylon with Tegris – a carbon fibre-like polypropylene tape manufactured by Milliken to achieve a lightweight yet strong product.

Kunal Mankodiya received the Innovator accolade for Woven-IoT – a “smart textile” Internet-of-Things for precision telemedicine, which the judges noted offers a range of practical home-monitoring solutions for major medical conditions, in patients for whom hospital visits are problematical.

Meanwhile, Inuheat Group won the Best Product – Clothing Textiles category for its flexible and conductive yarn for actively-heated clothing; and the Ground Breaking Partnership prize for its collaboration with various clothing brands on its Wearable Heating Platform.

WTiN launched the Future Textiles Awards (formerly the Future Materials Awards) in 2014, to recognise the outstanding achievements of companies and individuals across the technical textiles sector.

To see the full list of winners, visit https://www.futuretextilesawards.com/2017-winners/.

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