We want our making for others to express care and we want to teach others how to do this. Doing the “right thing” is not a question of automatically following a set of preordained rules because the long term implications of what we make can’t be perfectly predicted. We, therefore, disclose our process and critically examine our work together with a strong community committed to evolving guidelines together.
“Ethics” is the popular umbrella term for this matter of concern and includes such considerations as ergonomics, sustainability, durability, and access. In philosophy “ethics” appears next to the term “aesthetics” under the umbrella term “axiology”. Axiology is the study of values historically there has been an attempt to separate moral values (the “right” thing) from aesthetic qualities, e.g., “beauty”. Since we are building functional things with textiles which are strong carriers of aesthetic qualities, we choose to construe “ethics” broadly when designing e-textile solutions to encompass moral, functional, personal, and societal values.