Transforming Sports Bra Design and Increasing Health Literacy

Lead  Prof. YICK Kit Lun

School of Fashion and Textiles | Laboratory for Artificial Intelligence in Design

Exercise-induced breast motion causes discomfort and hinders athletic performance, yet traditional bra testing is costly time consuming, and reliant on trial and error. Prof. Yick Kit Lun’s team have developed a system combining a 'soft manikin' with 4D motion analysis to replicate three-dimensional human movement and soft tissue dynamics during sports.

The system has been adopted by a global testing firm (with revenue of US$6.2 billion) since 2019. It has also been licensed to a University's spin-out company founded by sports biomechanical experts and enabled designers and manufacturers to diversify product lines and shorten development timelines by 30%.

The biomechanically tailored sports bras have demonstrated measurable biomechanical advantages in the laboratory, and also achieved unprecedented satisfaction for female athletes. Customised sports bras were commissioned for Hong Kong elite athletes at the Paris Olympics. The team have further delivered a series of educational outreach programmes and educated 100+ adolescent girls through workshops merging science and health literacy.