Clothes in a Can?

By Trishanya Raju

While I’m a proponent of almost anything that brings the movie world to real life, this I’m a little skeptical of. Remember the Spray-on-Shoes from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs? Well, it looks like scientists have channeled their inner Flint Lockwood to produce canned clothing.

Yes, I said canned clothing. As if it weren’t already mass-produced enough.

The formula is comprised of short fibers bound to polymers and a solvent that dispenses the fabric in the form of a liquid. The product is sprayed onto a person’s skin, and dries almost instantly. This makes it easy for the “clothes” to be peeled off, because the polymers wouldn’t bind to skin.

A big plus is the fact that these clothes can apparently be recycled by simply cutting them up and dissolving them in a solution. The features of the material depend on the type of fibers mixed into the solution. This means that types of fibers could range from natural fibers such as wool, cotton, or silk as well as synthetic fibers such as nylon.

The team that invented this product is trying to adapt the technology to create spray on, lightweight, waterproof casts alongside military staff, to help those who have lost limbs in combat, displaying the many potential uses this product could have in different aspects of society. However, my guess is that it will be largely monopolized by the fashion industry.  

I, for one, am scared to be too hopeful about this technology. While I think it could revolutionize fields like emergency care (instant, sterile, canned bandages), it is very likely that this technology could be misappropriated into more commercial industries. 

This video highlights what I’m afraid the future of this technology looks like: