Nothing is ‘safe’ anymore from Wearable Electronics. During the CeBIT in Hannover (Germany), a very traditional clothing maker shows in the ‘smart Textile Village’, a special section of the CeBIT for Wearable Electronics, their contribution and exploration into the Wearable Electronic market.Lodenfrey presents traditional German Lederhosen with a built-in MP3 player and mobile phone management, very similar to the ’standard’ iPod clothing.
Lederhosen are very typical for Germany. Those are leather trousers preferred by thigh-slapping Bavarian dancers.
The Lederhose has a free speech mechanism for mobile phone and an MP3-Player with 512 megabyte of memory, which can be controlled via a textile keyboard on your thigh. The microphone is integrated into the shoulder strap of the Lederhose.
The Wearable Technology behind this product comes form Interactive Wear which means you need to use their own, limited MP3 player which we didn’t like by then and still do not like this concept now.
Lodenfrey is a very traditional company that creates and produces traditional, localized fashion. By using traditional clothing like the Lederhosen and merge them with the 21st century technology is a very encouraging initiative. We might see more of such blending of Wearable Tech and traditional fashion styles.
As far as we could find out, this Lederhosen model is a very limited edition and we couldn’t find any online shop nor any hint where to buy it on Lodenfrey’s Website.