Research on design features in senior brassiere through body factor analysis

Abstract

Nowadays, many senior women do sports, e.g., yoga, to improve their body health, however, they tend to be troubled by sagging breasts and difficulties to turn their arms and fasten the bra. Sports brassieres are designed mainly for young women. The current sports brassiere design in the market may not be suitable for senior women both causal social activities or sports, in such the aesthetic perception, functional requirement, human factor features are not well considered through design and numerical analysis. This research investigated the human factor design on senior brassiere using various design analysis and combine the numerical analysis and simulation to enhance the research in the area of deriving design features and framework for senior women clothing and sportswear. The research method conducted include human factor design analysis, breast shape feature analysis, motion capture and analysis on skin deformation, finite element analysis and simulation. The originality of this research is the interdisciplinary collaboration with the domain of design research to textile and clothing, and also mechanical engineering approach in supporting the design features in relation to human body factors and comfort. From the analysis of user personas, physical and psychological needs, sports exercise behaviour, brassieres design and comfort issues, and also with the reference from experiments, wear trial results, design criteria with features of construction were established. The idea of this was to ensure the brassiere that meet the design needs, has effective support, high stability and comfort in a way that is also easy to wear.