British Airways has been making hundreds of refinements to their onboard experience, all with their passengers’ happiness in mind. These included everything from added comfort levels in the seating to specially developed lighting and cuisine that counters changes in the palette brought on by altitude. They wanted to measure the benefits of these improvements and receive feedback to continue refining the experience. The idea was to develop something new that could allow the crew to monitor the real-time responses of passengers without continuously disturbing them.

We created the Mood Blanket, an unobtrusive wearable device that monitors the subtle variations in each passenger’s mood. The cashmere Blanket is woven with fibre optics that change colour based on various mood states. When anxious or tense, the blanket turns red. When content, it turns shades of purple. When relaxed, it turns blue, allowing the aircrew to see how passengers feel easily.

The device is used on selected flights with the new cabin configurations and will be implemented on other routes as the cabins are upgraded.