This littleBits hoodie will turn you into a walking music machine

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This wearable instrument will turn you into a music-making cyborg. 

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When it comes to music and fashion, what’s not to love? During Maker Faire Bay Area, we had a blast jamming away to some Iggy Azalea and Jeremih beats on our pair of DrumPants. With so much excitement around the project, we couldn’t help but browse the web for some other Atmel-based, tune-emitting clothing. And just like that, we stumbled upon a recent DIY hoodie from Liza Stark, who has discovered a pretty awesome (and super easy) way to transform herself into a walking instrument as well. The Maker did so by using nothing more than a Makey Makey bit, a littleBits Synth Kit, some conductive fabric and thread, and a little of her own ingenuity.

In order to create the digital sound interface, Stark devised switches out of conductive fabric and then placed them on different parts of a hoodie that her best friend had lying around. One side of the switch is the Makey Makey (ATmega32U4) input, the other ground. When both are touched simultaneously, it closes the switch and triggers a sound from the synth bits attached to the Makey Makey input.

“Play around with the synth bits to determine what configuration you like best,” Stark adds. “Since there are only three outputs, you can get really creative with the connector bits, the mix bit, and speaker bit if you have extra — we’re talking super fun sound textures here.”

The circuit is held together with gaffers tape on the front and back of the bits, while the Makey Makey module is sewn onto the hoodie using conductive thread. Meanwhile, Stark even added a few custom-designed touch pads of her own to the garment.

Intrigued? Check out the Maker’s step-by-step breakdown of the build here, and be sure to watch it in action below!