TEXTILES.ORG
Today’s adaptive apparel brands are more attractive, wearable and functional than ever before thanks to customer-responsive and thoughtful design development, especially with locations of findings and softness of fabric. They offer significant benefits for elderly populations; those recovering from surgery; people with dementia or chronic conditions such as arthritis, Parkinson’s and diabetes; those with sensory issues; wheelchair users; and more.
What’s in a fabric?
The success of adaptive apparel brands often lies in the details: The weight and feel of a fabric or the placement of a tag or a seam can be overweighted in importance for anyone with sensory issues, for example, but also for those experiencing cognitive changes.
“Anything that’s poking, itching or prodding ends up being a larger issue than you’d expect,” says Jimmy Zollo, cofounder of Joe & Bella, Chicago, Ill. “Someone living with cognitive change or extreme sensitivity will notice immediately if there’s anything itchy, isn’t breathable enough or adding any level of pressure. It’s been especially true for our women’s tops, where we’re continuing to fine-tune, test, improve and re-test.”
As people age, skin gets thinner and often more sensitive. Any additional pressure can cause a rash, scratch or skin tear, potentially leading to an infection. This then becomes a larger safety concern. The durability of the fabric is important, too, so each item of clothing holds up over time, washes well and maintains its fit. Adaptive designers might seek out a product that is antimicrobial and odor-resistant, anti-wrinkle (supporting both wearers and caregivers) and has added stretch.
Joe & Bella, in the adaptive market with its own products for two years, strives to make clothes that are altered in a way that makes dressing faster, safer, easier and more dignified.
“We design our clothes for older adults and folks living with changes related to physical or cognitive ability as they age. But we think by designing for that audience, we are really designing universally,” Zollo says. The Joe & Bella line has an assortment of polished-looking, easy-to-wear basics including chinos, sweaters, cardigans and tops.
Zollo notes that many individuals will struggle with incontinence at some point in their lives. His company’s CareZips® pants cleverly accommodate incontinence briefs or ostomies with a hidden inner-leg zipper. Other features of the company’s pants styles include a gusseted fit, hidden snap and zipper closures, and extra-long side zippers.
Maura Horton, founder and CEO of MagnaReady, Raleigh, N.C., says she and her team are constantly asked about better temperature-controlled fabrics. But adding tech properties such as SPF, cooling and stretch all add to a product’s overall cost. Finding the right balance of fabrication and affordable pricing is critical.
“The customers that we serve generally come from a fixed financial background, so pricing structure is super important, as we could price ourselves out of the industry,” she says. That said, Horton’s grateful to work with manufacturers that support making smaller test market quantities and trying different iterations of technology. She says in the beginning, that was very difficult to find.
MagnaReady launched in 2012. Horton recalls, “My husband, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s at an early age, wouldn’t wear anything that was on the market. Not only did we need to create the solution, but we needed to make it so good that you didn’t know there was a solution.”
The company’s flagship product was a wash-and-wear “button-down” dress shirt with discreet magnetic closures. The product line has expanded to men’s cardigans, jackets and jeans, women’s shirts, and more.
Partnerships
Adaptive clothing makers are always looking for the next strategic partnership with end-product manufacturers and fabric suppliers. They are diligent in sourcing materials and producing products that meet their buyers’ needs.
Horton says one of the most challenging parts of her business is finding manufacturers that can handle the technology required to work with magnets. For example, the magnets would attract machinery on the assembly line, so they had to customize production. Fabric weight also affected the magnet choice for each garment.
“Right now, we have a thicker cable-knit sweater and finding the right [magnet] strength for that was tricky. It’s difficult to play with the strengths without making [magnet] molds, which are super expensive,” Horton says. “So having a little flexibility there and even having more options with the shapes of the molds to support different positioning on apparel would be great.”
MagnaReady recently partnered with Brooks Brothers for a non-wrinkle fabric in its long-sleeve polo shirt. “The theory is, if you’re having difficulty buttoning, you’re probably also having difficulty ironing,” says Horton. “So we need to make sure we’re using easy-care fabrications as well. So much goes into not just the technology itself but what we’re pairing it with.”
Horton is always looking for more sustainable fabrics, including temperature-controlled and wrinkle-resistant fabrics that contain fewer chemicals. “We try to find ‘greige goods,’ or fabrics already made, and tap into that. Sustainable fabric is an important core for us, but sometimes cooling temps are not the best with these,” she says.
MagnaReady recently announced a partnership with a children’s brand and in 2025 is looking at additional partnerships and incorporating smart fabrics into its product lines.
The next frontier for Joe & Bella is socks, as balancing compression needs, ease of use and being nonirritating has been both “a fabric challenge and a functional design challenge,” Zollo says.
Adaptive is for everybody
This market doesn’t rest. Brand staff is always rethinking each fabric, feature and strategic partnership. Often, new ideas start with the end user.
Zollo says they are constantly responding to new market segments and requests—including requests to reverse-engineer a spouse’s closet.
“Learning from our customers and their caregivers has been huge. And that’s constantly in the back of our heads,” he says. “Something might work well for 90% of our audience, but can we close that gap by another 2 or 3%? That’s the true north we’re aiming for and, of course, it’s a hard place to get to.”
Horton agrees that customer feedback about technologies and fabrications—what’s working and what’s not—is the ultimate information.
She sees adaptive as a subset of activewear, as it’s being engaged with and used as a resource to live. She points to wearers who are post-surgery and in recovery. “Think about wheelchair users,” she says. “Talk about a true active-user feedback group—someone who’s sitting in a product for 12 hours and talking about where their sore spots may hit or where the fabric rides or stretches. We are testing [this product] just as much as a yoga studio tests its fabrics.”
While much of the innovation in this space starts with adaptive apparel brands catering to kids, in reality, adaptive brands serve every age and ability, and the 60-plus group is significant.
In 2034, there will be more Americans over age 65 than under age 18 for the first time, notes a 2020 report by the U.S. Census Bureau, and with age comes an increasing occurrence of disability. “The need for products that make the lives of older adults easier and more independent is more crucial than ever,” Zollo says.
Clothing’s final (discriminatory) frontier
But industry professionals like Zollo and Horton don’t just want to make adaptive clothing, they want to destroy the stigma associated with it, or what Zollo calls “one of the last discriminatory areas of clothing.”
He says, “We had this amazing, plus-size movement that has taken hold. … But when it comes to individuals living with disabilities, the focus just hasn’t been there, nor the innovation. So I’m excited that’s now starting to happen—and that we’ve been a part of it—with people noticing the change, talking about it and adopting it.”
Sara Scullin is a freelance writer and editor based in Wisconsin.
SIDEBAR: Pride in purpose
Adaptive apparel company founders have a clear mission driving them to serve their customers.
“We started in 2012 with one product in two colors and sold out within the first three months. So we knew we had something. My husband was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s, but I started seeing a wide range of people who had this common theme of wanting to remain independent, and they didn’t have any real solutions on the market. The last true invention in that space was Velcro®, and that was over 50 years ago. Once we launched with products, we wanted to keep growing it.”
–Maura Horton, CEO and founder of MagnaReady
“We get calls and emails every day, such as ‘This is the first time my loved one in a catheter has been able to get on an airplane in a long time,’ or ‘My son who has ALS finally has pants he feels comfortable wearing in class.’ But we also get asked to design for very specific use cases we hadn’t thought of.”
–Jimmy Zollo, Co-founder of Joe & Bella