UK firm hails breakthrough in clothing technology that could make garbage eye-sores a thing of the past

Have you ever imagined a world with no landfill? Well, if that proves a stretch, how about garbage dumps you could never see?

Well, now eco-conscious clothing brand Rapanui thinks it has solved the problem of unsightly piles of unwanted clothes by developing an invisible T-shirt.

Developed in conjunction with the University of Isle of Wight (UIoW), the Synthetic Optic Fibre fabric uses light conductive threads to capture light on one side of a garment and transfer it to the opposite side, creating the illusion it is no longer there.

Movie fans may remember similar technology using small cameras helped cloak James Bond’s car in 2002 film Die Another Day. However, scale and expense of the technology was prohibitive, until researchers started to use the light-transmitting properties of fibre optics – hence the name “Optic Fibre.”

“The research has been around for a long time but the principle is actually quite simple,” said Martin Drake-Knight, a designer at Rapanui. “Optic fibres … capture the light in the space immediately surrounding the garment and relay it through the threads. If you can direct this light directly out of the shirt, as we have done, the result is a vivid perception of invisibility.”

Professor Barry Green, a textiles specialist at UIoW, said variants of the produce could be used for all manner of applications, from slimming clothes to military camouflage.

While he added it would be “quite some time” before the technology could come to market, Professor Green said it would be entirely possible to make landfills seemingly disappear.

“Sustainability is an out-of-sight, out-of-mind problem,” he said. “We can throw invisible T-shirts in open-air landfill sites – or even just on the street – and nobody will know they are there.”