WELCOME TO BRA WEEK! This week and next, the Autostraddle writers and some special guests will be giving you the scoop on over-the-shoulder-boulder-holders and otherwise-inclined chest-covering situations — fashion, history, feelings and so much more.
I was so sad about bra week because I thought I’d already covered the only advanced bra out there— the bra that can detect cancer. Turns out, though, there’s a bunch of bra 2.0 out there. And they are as crazy as you imagine they would be.
The Bra That Unhooks For True Love
Yes. You read that correctly. Japanese company Ravijour invented a concept piece (as in, not for purchase thank God) earlier this year. Basically, the bra measures your heart rate and then unhooks in the front when that heart rate falls in line with what this company deems is true love. It is aptly called the True Love Tester. Here is the video explaining all the “science”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8Wd831gUt4
Just remind me not to wear this when I’m climbing the stairs to my apartment.
The Bra That Prevents Stress Eating
via NDTV Gadgets
Microsoft has developed a bra that uses a GRASP (yes) board and sensors to detect when the wearer is feeling stress. If it works as well as other Microsoft products, that means it doesn’t do that at all. Ostensibly, the benefit of such a bra is to prevent stress eating by letting the user know that they’re stressed. I have my own internal sensors for this, such as the splitting behind-the-eye headache and a few external sensors as well — the fact that I had an entire chocolate cake in the fridge and now it’s not there anymore. But hey, this is probably an opportunity for my boobs to get the blue screen of death for no reason. Plus it could probably be used for other purposes when it does work, being that the bra measures heart rate and respiration, along with a few other metrics. Probably more worthy purposes than telling woman not to eat things. We have all of everything else in the world to do that.
The Bra That Brags On Twitter
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1hSNg37K38
This bra tweets when it’s unhooked. When I first heard about the existence of this bra, I was basically like nooooo, whyyyyy? But then I read further and it turns out that it was created by a Greek ad agency, OgilvyOne Athens, and it was just one—not mass produced. It was worn last October by TV personality Maria Bakodimou to promote breast self-exam awareness, as part of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. “Each time I unhook it, the bra automatically sends a tweet. Reminding women of their breast self exam,” said Bakodimou. “Our mission? To deliver the life-saving message to everyone!” The campaign is long over, but you can still see the tweets @TweetingBra.
The App That Will Help You Get a Bra
via Hello Beautiful
The only thing in this round up that’s consumer technology and the only thing that is useful —if you hate shopping and going to malls as much as I do, you may be interested to know that heading to your local purveyor of bras isn’t the only way to make sure yours fits and to purchase new ones. Thirdlove is an online lingerie shop with an app that will size you up with the help of a few chesticle selfies. The app is free and the bras are not super expensive (they don’t, however, go higher than a DD. But they do half sizes in the cup and unusual band sizes!). The bras are also pretty and they have matching panties too!
This has been the seventy-fourth installment of Queer Your Tech with Fun, Autostraddle’s nerdy tech column. Not everything we cover is queer per se, but we talk about customizing this awesome technology you’ve got. Having it our way, expressing our appy selves just like we do with our identities. Here we can talk about anything from app recommendations to choosing a wireless printer to web sites you have to favorite to any other fun shit we can do with technology.
Headers by Rory Midhani
Feature image via Huffington Post
Immediately concerned about how you would remove the first bra at the end of an evening of not finding ‘true love’. Does it stay on forever? How do you shower? No more bra removal sighs of relief?
Also, it looks like it would fly off & hit your ‘true love’ in the eye.
you’re gonna need deanne smith for that.
If Apple made the stress eating bra Siri would be your life coach.
I seem to recall a bra that collected solar energy being a thing people talked about for awhile. Apparently we were going to be able to charge our ipods or something.
I think Microsoft have the right idea, but I want a bra that when I’m tired, loosens by an inch. I don’t need telling I’m stressed, I need relief.
My boobs can only politely be referred to as ENORMOUS. If the first one unhooks without warning – say, while I’m running to catch the bus – someone’s getting hurt.
“Plus it could probably be used for other purposes when it does work, being that the bra measures heart rate and respiration, along with a few other metrics. Probably more worthy purposes than telling woman not to eat things. We have all of everything else in the world to do that.”
1) So f@cking true.
2) This is why we need more women in engineering! Women, who have completely different life experiences than men, need to hold the engineering and design reigns for a while.
Thinking about the patriarchy is stressing me out – good thing I have a physically restrictive undergarment which also tells me not to eat anything!