Breeyn McCarney’s Paper Dolls collection mixes fashion with technology

The once opposite worlds of fashion and technology will converge tomorrow evening when emerging Toronto designer Breeyn McCarney appears on the Nat & Marie webcast (it’s no This American Life, that’s for sure) to show her groundbreaking new Paper Dolls collection, which debuted this month at Toronto’s Alternative Fashion Week.

Developed in collaboration with creative technologist Christopher Lewis (who will also be on the show), the collection features dresses constructed entirely out of hand-cut paper and fitted with a series of L.E.D. lights. This is the tech-savvy component: the lights, controlled by any mobile device, can be changed to display one of 16 colours, making the creation and spectacle of fashion more interactive. “It was designed with the expectation that a wearer could interact with others (say, at a party), and allow other people to remotely control the dress,” explained Lewis on his website. Viewers tuning in to tomorrow night’s webcast can control the dresses using their smartphones or web browsers by navigating over to the project’s website at 9 p.m.

McCarney hangs her inventive hat on pushing the boundaries of design and fashion, and if Paper Dolls is any indication, we’ll be waiting in giddy anticipation over what she has in store for us next. We just hope the Nat & Marie studio doesn’t have decorative candles or a fireplace.