Hey! Did You Know You Can 3D Print Your Home, Kayaks, Oreos and More?!
It’s true! All of it. Another month has passed and another OMG of 3D goodness has filled up our inbox, bookmark bar and Twitter feed. Here’s a look at what had us oo-ing, ah-ing and Gchatting to each other this month. Besides our awesomely adorable 3D printed elephants.
1. Fashion Geeks Out: San Francisco mag did this gorgeous spread of spring’s hottest fashions and 3D printed accessories to go with each of the looks, which made us fall head over heels for Endswell and their 3D printed jewelry cast in solid gold.
2. The First 3D Printed House Broke Ground: This month, 3D printers laid the first bricks for the world’s premiere 3D printed house in Amsterdam. Each room will be printed separately on site and joined together like large LEGO-like blocks. We can’t wait to follow this one and see what kind of interior decoration goes down in a printed house.
3. Flexy-Hand: Printers are proving that they’re worth their weight in PLA and beyond thanks to their “hand” in helping to make advancements in the field of prosthetics. This one truly breaks the mold as the most realistic prosthetic hand we’ve seen yet.
4. DIY LEGOs: We know, you’re like, “You can’t do this yet?!” No! Well, not officially, but hopefully soon you’ll be able to 3D print your own bricks and mini LEGO peops at home. The company has revealed that they’re keeping an eye on 3D printing and tinkering with the idea of how to use the technology with their customers. We can’t wait.
5. World’s First Printed Kayak: Nothing in life comes easy, especially not the world’s first 3D printed Kayak, which took 42 days to print all 28 parts in a large scale, custom built printer. After, each colorful piece was bolted together with silicone.
6. Alessandro Zambelli’s 3D Printed Lights for .exnovo: A) How dreamy are these pendant and table lights? And B) How cool is it that their shades were created using 3D printing?! The designer created a set of three different shades featuring a pattern of small holes, which follow mathematical patterns found in nature.
7. Twitter-Trending Oreos: Using the hashtag #eatthetweet, hungry attendees at SXSWi could Tweet votes for what flavor of Oreo (cookie AND creme) they wanted to sink their sweet teeth into. The coolest part? They were free! No, not that, although, mmm, free Oreos. The cookies were 3D printed, each in about two minutes. 3D printing wasn’t supposed to hog the spotlight at this year’s tech fest, but articles about this were sent to us approximately every five minutes.
8. Customizable Drooloop Flowers: We showed you how romantic 3D printed roses were in place of your usual dozen this Valentine’s Day — here you can print out your own customizable, one-of-a-kind bouquet all year round. The uniqueness of each bunch comes from the in-air printing method you’ll do that creates the “droop loops” aka the petals. Love this colorful bouquet for Mother’s Day!
9. RoboCop’s New Look: 3D printing can often sound like the stuff movies are made of and, in this case, it is! The RoboCop remake featured a reboot inside the reboot: RC’s suit. Parts of it were “grown” using high-definition 3D printers.
10. 3D Printed Top: This took the top prize in a 3D printed fashion competition calling for sustainable pieces inspired by water. We would like to point out that this beautiful bustier was also inspired by all of our dreams and Pins.
11. Giant 3D Printer: An obstacle right now in 3D printing big things is finding a printer that can take on the task. Enter: “Le Big Rep” (yes, it’s a Pulp Fiction reference). The biggest open source 3D printer ever weighs 440 pounds, costs $39,000 and will hopefully be able to print out an entire table.
12. Barbie Custom Armor: If you’re looking for a way to make your kids’ Barbies a little more badass, support the Kickstarter to make her some custom 3D printed armor! You have to admit that these are a little cooler than the homemade clothes you used to stitch up for Barbz and Skipper.
13. Francis Bitonti Studio’s Brumal Bodies & Bristle Dress: The challenge of printing malleable, organic, cotton-like fibers is obviously not stopping the fashion world from giving us all they got and can 3D print. This was a collaboration that came out of a ten-day workshop where students designed and printed on a MakerBot. More, please!
14. 3D Printed Models of Your House: Not to be confused with the 3D printed house that you’ll someday be able to live in (see above) you can also print out 3D models of your current digs in place of blueprints. This will make things much easier to visualize, for you and whoever might be helping you build, renovate or decorate it.
What 3D printing innovation got your motor running recently? Share below!
