Montreal-based designer Ying Gao has created a pair of garments embedded with soft mirrors and eye-tracking robotic components that transform when people look at them.
The collection, which features mirrors made by fusing glass and silicone, aims to challenge conventional notions of self-perception and visibility in the digital age.
Embedded with eye-tracking technology, the garments react to the observer’s gaze, triggering micro-actuators that cause the material to ripple and shift.
Microcontrollers and sensors are discreetly integrated into the pieces and powered by lightweight, rechargeable lithium batteries.
Expanding on Gao‘s long-standing exploration of interactive design, the collection draws on Italian philosopher Umberto Eco’s idea that mirrors offer an impression of both virtuality and reality.
“Mirrors are not just reflective surfaces – they are thresholds where reality and illusion converge,” Gao told Dezeen. “Within clothing, they create a layered experience, one that does not simply reflect an image but fragments and reshapes perception.”
The garments ripple when people look at them
The garments aim to explore the idea of perception in an age where AI and digital culture continuously reshape how we see ourselves.
“Self-perception today is shaped as much by screens as by direct experience,” Gao said. “These garments embody that condition, both literally and conceptually.”
“Like digital reflections, they do not offer a singular, stable image but a shifting, fragmented presence.”
To create a flexible mirror surface that can move with its wearer, Gao experimented with different combinations of glass and silicone, eventually creating a hybrid material that retains its reflective properties while allowing for movement.
“The soft mirror material does not simply reflect, it shifts, fragments, and distorts, making the wearer both present and displaced,” Gao said.
The mirror pieces were assembled using medical cotton gauze refined with 18-carat gold finishing and sewn onto the garments.
While not intended for everyday use, the garments are not purely conceptual. Gao compares them to haute couture and says they are built to last and “designed to withstand interaction”.
“Like haute couture, which serves as a laboratory for experimentation, the pieces challenge materiality, movement, and perception,” Gao said.
“Their purpose is not practicality in a conventional sense, but to shift perspectives, to propose new ways of thinking about clothing, technology, and presence.”
The electronic components were designed to be modular, allowing for maintenance and repair, while cleaning involves localised treatments rather than traditional washing.
“These pieces invite us to rethink our relationship with clothing, one that values preservation, interaction, and continuity over disposability,” Gao said.
Through this collection, Gao wants to push the limits of what clothing can be by combining fashion and technology.
“My work has always questioned the limits of textiles, how they move, how they interact with the body, and how they respond to external forces,” Gao said.
“Incorporating materials like mirrors, robotics and responsive elements allowed me to push this further, transforming clothing into something more than just fabric on skin – an active participant in perception.”
Gao’s previous works include a pair of dresses that expand and contract in response to colours and a collection with fibrous panels that become animated in the presence of strangers.
The photography is by Malina Corpadean.
