Stefanie Mallon is a cultural anthropologist and textile scientist at the University of Göttingen, Germany, with a research focus on Materiality and Sustainability in Fashion and Textiles. Recent publications include an article on ‘Digital fashion and the future of fashion’ which analyses users’ garment experience, a paper on ‘Performative aging in swim wear’, and an empirical study on fungus as an alternative for leather. Further works are the co-edited anthology ‘Death and the thing’ with studies about the meaning and functionality of textiles in the context of ‘death’, and an article titled ‘Thinking through fashion – Thinking fashion through’, which reflects on students’ perspectives on the future of fashion. Galina Mihaleva is an artist, fashion and wearable technology designer. Mihaleva’s artistic practice and academic research deals primarily with the dialogue between body and dress, driven by the idea of having both a physical and a psychological relationship with a garment as responsive clothing.