Carlo Volpi reports from Paris

Shima Seiki was the only machine manufacturer to show at Knitwear Solutions. In addition to their popular Wholegarment machines and the new SRY series that are able to perform inlay stitches, the Japanese company introduced the updated version of their APEX 3 software.

This package already offered endless possibilities to virtually design and realistically create a preview of any garment and the new improvements will help industry professionals even further to create accurate designs in little time and with small resources.

APEX 3 software improvements

At a first glance, the brush library has been improved with buttons and zips. Naturally, all these trims can be scanned in and used on any design with realistic photographic precision to help facilitate the design process.

The mesh mapping feature is also an interesting improvement that allows users to download any image and place it anywhere on a garment, creating a realistic looking intarsia motif.

The 3D modellist section, that enabled designers to preview the look and the drape of their creations on a person, has also been improved with more models and a more realistic look for draping and gathering.

One of the main obstacles in producing knitwear is the bridge between designing and programming: very often designers are not competent programmers and vice versa. With the improvements that Shima Seiki has made to their Loop Edit function, users are now able to design stitch structures and shapes that are automatically translated into a package, ready for production.

The colourways function has also had some aesthetic enhancements, enabling designers to preview yarns as a knitted swatch, a woven fabric or on a hank.

Machinery

Wholegarment technology pioneered by the Japanese manufacturer has considerably cut down production times by eliminating the finishing process.

Now Shima want to educate their customers to broaden their vision of this amazing technology: Wholegarment can indeed be used to produce finished, seamless garments, but it can also be employed to create intricate fabrics with jacquards, cables and stitch structures, for examples.

Some of the garments knitted on Wholegarment machines that were on display had seams but they were produced using techniques that wouldn’t be possible or would be very time consuming using conventional machinery.

Shima also introduced their new SRY series machines that are able to produce inlay fabrics. The machines come in 4 gauges: 7, 10, 12 and 14 and they have been very popular amongst many companies who produce knitwear but who also use wovens: the SRY can knit and fully fashion very fine inlay fabrics that are practically identical to wovens.

The design possibilities that this technology offers are obviously very exciting: for instance there could be developments in the processing times and the properties of suiting fabrics, as these could be knitted and shaped on SRYs.

Woven effects could also be integrated with knitted structures, like cables, in the same fabric, and the different properties of these two techniques could be used to manipulate the stretch of the cloth in strategic places. SRY machines are not simply designed for inlaying, but they do function very well as a standard Shima Seiki.