Amisha Gadani’s Blowfish Dress

Amisha Gadani made this “Blowfish Dress,” a kinetic interactive outfit that inflates like a blowfish.

While browsing through a book of marine images, I was inspired by the sudden and quite comical defense system of blowfish. I began to muse of ways in which humans could benefit from and appropriate these behaviors and so came up with this project. My defensive dress has four rip-stop nylon bladders connected to four muffin fans that inflate when I make a fist and connect the two black leads snaking around my arm into my hand. Appearing long, dark and elegant at rest, the dress transforms as the bladders inflate causing the outer layer to slip back and expose the vibrant and stunning teal skirt beneath. Created for the Exploratorium wearable art show, 2nd Skin, this piece is designed to camouflage to a cocktail party and to inflate like a blowfish when I’m intimidated.

Photo by Amy Snyder for the Exploratorium.