Human Centered Design Ph.D. students Wenjia Zong and Yoon Yang took their start-up business, Lacuna Technology to phase one of the eLab—an accelerator program for student startups. “We are trying to develop an algorithm to create better patterns based on body shape,” said Zong, Lacuna’s chief executive officer, who is studying with Fatma Baytar, assistant professor of Human Centered Design and director of the Digital Fashion and Body Lab.

Lacuna Technology is developing a consumer mobile app that takes photos, translates them into body shape i.e. rectangular, hourglass, pear, and predicts size. Most women’s clothing is based on an hourglass shape and then scaled for smaller or larger sizes. The company’s core value is body shape categorization. Yang, Lacuna’s head of design, comes from a background in patternmaking. Using data science they are designing an algorithm based on body shape. “We want the fashion industry to rethink the production process and allow consumers to select better fitting clothing by improving design,” explained Zong. Improving clothing fit also reduces clothing returns and waste and increases customer satisfaction.

The eLab, a collaboration between Entrepreneurship at Cornell and the Student Agencies Foundation bridges business and academia, providing students with the knowledge to start a company from IT to legal, funding to company valuation. “The NYC Pitch Night was an amazing experience. We were on-stage speaking to investors and audience-members. They really work you hard. It was a good journey,” said Zong. The company did not qualify for the eLab second-round, but the team is in discussion with manufacturers in the United States and China that are interested in the product.