Lululemon spent two years designing his new rug. He partnered with the Canadian Sports Institute in Calgary, Alberta to study how people use their yoga mats. The team developed a kind of “heat map” of use zones by tracking the spots that most hit people during their use. These data, along with an analysis of the worn areas on used yoga mats, gave the design team a clear picture of where the ripples should be placed, and where priming was needed.
Most of Lululemon’s previous yoga mats were made with a rubber bottom cover with a grippy polyurethane surface coating. According to Morris, the usual method of creating a three – dimensional surface would be like the ripples in the Take Form mat through capping – pushing a heating die into the surface so that the material is in shape. The problem is that Lululemon cannot apply that process in their yoga mats, because they are built. The rubber base does not bear the death, and the surface coating uses a kind of porous polyurethane melted from the heat.
The solution was to develop a foam concoction that would harden and retain its shape. That foam strip is then inserted between the rubber runner and the polyurethane surface. Lululemon will not describe how this foam process works, citing its proprietary nature, but Morris compares it to baking a cake.
“Gases start out as a liquid, and like the medicine, they foam,” he says.
The Take Form mat costs between $ 118 and $ 128 depending on the version, and will be available worldwide on March 23rd.
Sanchia Legister shows right way. Note the position of her hands and feet. Perfect!
Photo: LululemonThe market for new yoga mats – whether decorated with 3D ripples or not – is very different now than it was back when Lululemon started developing the Take form. Motivated by the remoteness of the pandemic, demand for home exercise equipment will explode in 2020. But even as vaccines become available and the world moves towards a somewhat normal level, it is that movement of people who prefer to sweat their homes instead of in gyms and maybe not a yoga studio.
Alignment mats can be especially helpful if you don’t have a yoga instructor coming over you and actively monitoring your form.
A gear that offers this type of self-steering gear will fit Lululemon’s strategy for fully embracing the work movement at home. Although the company lost sales from its retail stores early in the pandemic, its online sales went up. Also, last June, Lululemon acquired the fitness company at home Mirror for $ 500 million. A pair of mats that support alignment with personalized lessons brought into your home through Mirror get very close to personal yoga teaching experience. Now if the company wants to jump on the next obvious yoga move, it just needs to start selling some goats.
More great WIRED stories