Printing

Architecture
Innovative Recipes
for 3D Printing
Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello
of Emerging Objects

Princeton Architectural Press New York

 6 Foreword 9 Introduction
Back to Mud Emerging Objects

Dries Verbruggen, and Unnatural
Unfold Materials

15 3D-Printing
Methods

1 2
18 Salt 32 Sawdust
Contents

22 3D Printing with Salt 36 3D Printing with Sawdust

and Newsprint
28 Objects
40 Objects

3 4
46 Coffee, Tea, 62 Rubber
and Wine
66 3D Printing with Rubber
68 Objects

50 3D Printing with Coffee,

Tea, and Wine Waste
52 Objects
 5 6

72

76
Bioplastic
3D Printing with Bioplastic
96

98
Sand
3D Printing with Sand
80 Objects 108 Objects

7 8
114 Cement 138 Clay

Contents
118 3D Printing with Cement 142 3D Printing with Clay
126 Objects 152 Objects

9

160

161
Recipes
Liquid Binder 168 Acknowledgments
162 Powders 170 Project Credits
172 Notes
164 DIY Recipes 174 Image Credits
 Back
to Mud
Mud. Or, more specifically, a few dozen of 3D printing: the first is “Manufacturing
PowerPoint slides of intriguing vernacular complexity is free.” Unlike in traditional man-
mud constructions. That’s all that was need- ufacturing processes, where extra complexity
ed for me to understand that the work of requires more expensive tooling, there is
Emerging Objects was more deeply connect- no such penalty with 3D printing. And hence
ed with our own discourse at Unfold than I we witness a flood of algorithmic designs
had previously realized. While I was intimate- straight from the future that exploit this free-
ly familiar with Ronald Rael and Virginia dom as if the objects were unbound by the
San Fratello’s research on 3D printing archi- laws of physics, the limits of real-world mate-
tectural components with sustainable and rials, or the age-old traditions and heritage
Foreword

locally sourced materials, I had somehow of making things.

missed their shared, longtime fascination for But what Ron presented onstage was not
earthen architecture. That is, until I sat down a story about elaborate computational design
on the cozy chairs of the California College but a love story for the mundane material
of the Arts auditorium in 2015 during the that is mud: how it is ingrained in the tradi-
Data Clay Symposium, where Ronald and I tion of building worldwide, how “one half of
each gave a presentation about our respec- the population lives, works, or worships in
tive practices in architecture and design. buildings constructed of earth.” The story of
In recent years we’ve witnessed an un- architecture for thousands of years has been
paralleled explosion of creative expression the story of mud. And where clay or earth
and experimentation with 3D printing—not has not been easily sourced, similar narra-
only as a practical tool, but increasingly tives can be told with wood, rocks, or ice
as a medium in its own right. A lot of media playing the lead role. It was at that point that
attention has gone to the wild and often I understood that this love for the historic
baroque geometric-form languages that have and contemporary use of earth in architec-
been unlocked by the underpinning charac- ture is the root of Emerging Objects’ quest
teristics of 3D printing. Hod Lipson described to find a role for new technologies while
in his book Fabricated: The New World of respecting the codes of how we’ve been con-
6 3D Printing the ten fundamental principles structing our dwellings for ages—with locally
sourced, renewable materials that possess to the act of bricklaying as possibly one of
intrinsic, enduring architectural qualities: the oldest additive manufacturing methods.
humidity regulation, structural stability, natu- The work of Emerging Objects has, since
ral cooling, and so on. its inception, been mostly focused on binder
Only a handful of slides in that presen- jetting 3D-printing processes that fuse a pow-
tation were devoted to 3D printing, but for dered dry material. The company has been
me they brought the story full circle, and the internationally recognized for pushing the lim-
project shown—the Cool Brick masonry sys- its of this technique by introducing new ma-
tem—is probably my favorite among the proj- terials into a normally closed-source machine.
ects you’ll find in this book. The Cool Brick Since a 3D object printed with binder jetting
provides passive evaporative cooling similar is always supported by the powder with which
to how buildings were cooled in ancient it is constructed, this process offers some
Oman before the advent of refrigeration, with of the greatest freedom of form of all 3D-
a system called the Muscatese window, con- printing techniques. As such, it seems like a
sisting of a porous ceramic jar sheltered from regression that Virginia and Ronald recently
the sun by a wood mashrabiya latticework. started venturing into extrusion-based wet
The design of the Cool Brick combines these clay printing, a process with much greater lim-

Foreword
elements in a brick-size ceramic lattice that itations in regard to obtainable form freedom.
absorbs moisture and cools the air that flows My studio, Unfold, developed this process
through its open structure. In a clever way, in 2009 out of an interest in bridging digital
the Cool Brick exploits the benefits of Lip- manufacturing and the age-old clay-forming
son’s first principle, “Manufacturing complex- technique called coiling. But judging by the
ity is free,” while handily cycling around the impressive and rapidly developing body of
pitfall of craftsmanship mimicking excessive work that Emerging Objects has gathered un-
ornamentation that is so often associated der the moniker GCODE.clay, it certainly feels
with 3D printing. In a final act, the individual as though using wet clay, with its intrinsic lim-
bricks have been assembled in an unapolo- itations and quirky behavior, might be some
getic way by setting them in mortar, alluding sort of a homecoming—a return to the mud.

Dries Verbruggen

With his partner, Claire Warnier, Dries Verbruggen

leads Antwerp-based design studio Unfold.
Together they wrote Printing Things: Visions
and Essentials for 3D Printing. 7
Introduction

8
 Emerging Objects and
Unnatural Materials
At some point in their history, all building the idea of handcraft and introduced a
materials exist as particulate matter—dust, deviation to the material lineage of trans-
powder, or grains. Iron ore is crushed and forming the small into the large.
ground into fine particles before it can be Our interest in 3D printing is directly
transformed into steel. The subtractive connected to traditional construction tech-
process of cutting and sanding wood reduces niques. For many years we traveled the
trees to sawdust. Grains of sand are melted globe to study architecture constructed of
to form crystal-clear glass. The provenance friable soils (mud brick, rammed earth,
of particles—where they come from and cob), which took us to Peru, Yemen, China,
how materials migrate—begins as geology Argentina, and closer to home in the Ameri-

Introduction
or biology; becomes architecture via design; can Southwest. Based on this research,
and, in the end, evolves into archaeology Ronald completed his first book in 2008,
or anthropology, as the specialists of those Earth Architecture (Prince­ton Architectural
professions filter through the dust to uncover Press), which presented the most widely
the fascinating history of material culture used building material on the planet—earth
that traces a journey from mines, deserts, (soil, clay, gravel, and sand)—as relevant
evaporation ponds, agricultural fields, forests, to contemporary and modern architecture.
or factories. In the book’s afterword, a future scenario
Building from the ground-up, and for the material was proposed—one that
understanding history, is central to our phi- would use computer-aided design (CAD)
losophy of conceiving of and making larger and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM)
objects. The accretion of small particles processes. While it is commonly considered
or the assembly of small building compo- that digital manufacturing and earthen
nents to create larger ones is not a new idea. architecture exist at opposing ends of the
While humankind has performed the tasks technological spectrum, we embarked on
of adding water to dust to make clay, then research to bridge the wide gap that exists
shaping clay into bricks, bricks into buildings, among nonindustrial, industrial, and digital
and buildings into cities for more than ten modes of production, expanding the benefits
thousand years, 3D printing has disrupted of each. 9
 Haeckel Bowls 3D printed in
cement, wood, and salt
Introduction

In 2009 an article appeared in Ceramics in developing materials for architectural

Monthly on the possibility of 3D printing production began.
with clay, by Mark Ganter and his collab- The computer and the 3D printer have
orators in the Department of Mechanical allowed us to use particles of light, jets
Engineering at the University of Washington.1 of water, and bits of data to transform dust
Ganter had also begun to publish a series into customized objects and products that
of open-source recipes for 3D-printable serve as new building blocks for the future,
materials on the website Open 3DP. 2 Through using materials that are locally available,
collaborations with Ganter during this time, inexpensive, and derived from sustainable
we experimented with several of these sources or waste streams. These materials
open-source recipes and began to build on can be upcycled or transformed into durable
them and on our own interests in certain and beautiful architectural components
materials, their sources, and their cultural that possess the potential for weathering,
significance. tactility, and strength. The substances ex-
It is through the lens of 3D-printing plored in this book—cement, sand, clay, salt,
technology, coupled with an interest in craft sawdust, coffee, tea, rubber, and others—
10 traditions and place, that our explorations all begin in powder form. Through 3D print-
ing, they have formed the basis of unique manufacturing (nutshells, coffee grounds,
explorations that envision a twenty-first- grape skins)—might situate them in the
century architectural terroir that influences realm of natural building materials. However,
the crafting of objects and their meaning. the expansive and nascent potential of these
Our research challenges the limited traditional materials, when coupled with
sources available for rapid prototyping additive manufacturing, offers unnatural
materials by introducing new possibilities possibilities, such as the ability to be formed
for digital materiality. For us, it is not solely with no formwork, to have translucency
the computational aspects that have poten- where there was none before, and to possess
tial for material transformation but also directed structural capabilities and the
the design of the materials themselves. The potential for water absorption and storage.
nature of these materials—that they can be The material condition often referred to
sourced locally (salt, ceramic, sand); come as alternative or “natural” building materials
from recycled sources (paper, sawdust, now encompasses unnatural building
rubber); and are by-products of industrial materials.

Turning the small into the big

Introduction
Considering the particle and the part and 3D printers often do not complete their
their inherent possibilities is not the only way tasks—it is a trial-and-error process that
we conceive of scaling up additive manufac- typically requires multiple starts to finish a
turing. When we embarked on this research, print job. If a large printer is used and a
3D printers were expensive and small. The print job requires hundreds of hours, a failed
largest 3D printers within a reasonable price print is a very time-consuming endeavor.
range were designed to fit through a door Rather, we have employed the notion of a
or sit on your desk. This limited the size of “print farm”—a battery of many 3D printers,
the object that the 3D printer could pro- each producing different parts. If one printer
duce. Rather than see this as a limitation to fails, other printers can continue the task.
producing architecturally scaled objects, we In our farm, we grow larger structures from
realized that there are several advantages smaller 3D-printed blocks, bricks, or tech-
to printing smaller parts to create larger tiles. The beauty of a large, 3D-printed struc-
objects. The first is that 3D printing, despite ture built of hundreds or thousands of small-
having existed for over three decades, is er nonstandard or customized components
relatively new in the history of object mak- is that each part can be individually fine-
ing, and an imperfect technology. As most tuned to respond to the geomemetic partic-
people who have worked with them know, ularities of a complex form. Each component 11
 can acknowledge its position in space rela-
tive to the whole—by encoding the instruc-
tions directly on the block—and to external
forces such as climate, solar orientation, and
adjacent programming requirements.
This process of working from the small
to the large at times requires us to work
backward—from the large to the small, subdi-
viding large constructions into their constit-
uent printable parts. Because smaller parts
are at the scale of the hand, like the bricks
humankind has used historically to construct
buildings and cities, they are easily handled
and assembled and do not require special
skills or tools, no matter the ultimate com-
plexity of an exuberant 3D-printed structure.
By 3D printing small, fundamental architec-
Introduction

tural components, we aim to make 3D-printed

architecture accessible, interactive, and
related to the craft traditions of the past but
with all the yet-to-be-explored potential that
this emerging technology has to offer.

12
3D-printed parts being assembled
 Introduction

PrintFARM (Print Facility 13

for Architecture, Research,
and Materials)
 3D Printing Architecture

Additive manufacturing will transform the ships among the traditionally separate fields
way buildings are made. Architects can use that define design, visualization, structural
3D printing to become material morpholo- optimization, budgeting, and construction.
gists; it is a medium that ascribes value to In addition, 3D printing is a potentially
design. Materials go in—and a product comes sustainable method of manufacturing. It
out. The driving factor in that process is de- can take advantage of local and ecological
sign, which, as the research scientist Andreas material resources and serve as a vehicle for
Bastian points out, integrates both quanti- upcycling, and it produces very little waste
tative and qualitative information, turning when compared with subtractive methods of
raw material into a valuable and meaningful production. Another advantage of 3D printing
object.3 architectural products is that they can be
Traditional craft culture involved a direct made on demand, so there is no surplus, no
relationship between the craftsperson, the storage, and no shipping products around
material, and the product, but the Industrial the world—printed parts or digital files can
Revolution fractured these relationships. be sent to job sites, where components can
Designers were no longer connected to the be fabricated in situ. In an era of disposable
Introduction

machine that made a product or the materials products, overconsumption, excessive energy
used in its manufacturing. However, 3D print- use, and toxic materials, architects have a
ing reconnects the designer to the material responsibility—to the public and the plan-
and the machine. In fact, the designer can et—to change our mind-set about what our
design the materials, the machine, the soft- buildings are made of and how they function,
ware, and the product—expanding architects’ by engaging directly with the manufacturing
capabilities to create more intimate relation- processes used to construct architecture.

14
 3D-Printing
Methods
ZPrinter 310 Plus powder
printer jetting binder onto
There are many different methods of addi- cement powder

tive manufacturing, but the three types

used most frequently by Emerging Objects
are binder jetting, fused deposition model-
ing, and paste extrusion. We use these types
of 3D-printing technologies because the
machines themselves are not designed for a
specific material, only a material dimension,
and that allows for material exploration and
innovation.

Binder Jetting, invented at MIT in 1993,

consists of spraying, or jetting, liquid binder
material on a thin layer of powder. The liquid
binder solidifies the powder; then, another
thin layer of powder is rolled out over the
top of the previous layer. This operation
is repeated hundreds, if not thousands, of
times; after the process is complete, the
three-dimensional object must be excavated
from the loose powder surrounding it. This
loose powder also serves as support material,
which allows overhangs, undercuts, and com- waste. Printed parts can then be infused with
plex forms to be created. The object is then a coating, or postprocessed, to provide addi-
cleaned with a brush to remove the loose tional strength. Wax, low-VOC epoxies, glues,
powder, and the remaining powder is blown and water can all serve as strengthening
away or vacuumed off. The remaining powder materials—the selection of which depends on
can be recycled and reused in subsequent the part’s material and the application of the
prints, which means that there is little to no final product. 15
Fused deposition
modeler 3D printing
bioplastic

Fused Deposition Modeling, or FDM, was de-

veloped by S. Scott Crump in the late 1980s
and commercialized in 1990. One advantage
of using an FDM printer is its relatively low
cost; desktop FDM printers are inexpensive,
as is the plastic filament used by the printers.
In addition, the parts do not need any post-
processing.
Fused deposition modeling is commonly
used for prototyping but rarely for making
final products. FDM works on the additive
principle by depositing plastic filament along
a predetermined path. The filament is un-
wound from a coil and supplied to an extru-
sion nozzle. The metal nozzle is heated and
melts the plastic, which is then extruded
through the nozzle and deposited on a build
platform. Printed objects using FDM meth-
ods are fabricated from the bottom up, one
layer at a time. FDM is capable of dealing
with overhangs that are supported by lower
layers, but large overhangs and cantilevers
16 require a printed scaffolding.
Paste Extrusion is rapidly becoming an
accessible means of 3D printing very diverse
materials. Quite simply, in this process, a
paste, stored in a tube, is pushed through a
nozzle and onto a build platform. The paste is
pushed by either compressed air or a syringe
or ram press. This is suitable for materials
Potterbot paste
as varied as cement, clay, Play-Doh, silicone, extruder 3D printing
clay
resin, frosting, UV paste, mashed potatoes,
chocolate, and many others. Extruding a
line of paste onto a build bed is similar to
traditional FDM methods of printing, except
that the material is not heated in the nozzle.
As in FDM, objects are built from the bottom
up, layer by layer. Currently, the diameter
of paste extrusion can range anywhere from
0.0001 millimeters, for bio-nks used in the
production of cells for organs, to 25 centi-
meters wide, for mud and concrete used to
make entire buildings.
Early users of computer numerically con-
trolled (CNC) paste extrusion include Adrian
Bowyer, who started the RepRap Project
with a paste extruder in 2005, before filament
extruders became commonplace; Behrokh
Khoshnevis, who developed a contour craft-
ing machine that extruded cement in the late
1990s; and Evan Malone and Hod Lipson,
who released the Fab@Home multimaterial
3D printer in 2006. But it was not until 2009, popular, because of the low cost of the
when Dries Verbruggen, of Unfold Design machines, the low cost of the material itself,
Studio, rapidly advanced paste extrusion and the durability of the clay once it has
through the invention of the “claystruder” been fired in a kiln; additionally, there is no
that the process became attainable and visi- waste, since all the leftover, dried clay can be
ble to a larger audience. Over the last ten reused. Many open-source kits for building
years, clay extrusion has become very clay 3D printers are now available online. 17
Salt
Buildings made of salt have existed since to bodies of water or mined from rock salt
antiquity. Over two thousand years ago, when deposits deep below the surface of the earth.
the Greek historian Herodotus (ca. 484– Therefore, salt has been used as a material
425 BCE) journeyed to North Africa, he saw for building both above and below the
“masses of great lumps of salt in hillocks” ground. One of the most interesting sites of
where men dwelled in houses built of salt salt harvesting in the world is the Wieliczka
blocks.1 Herodotus was no doubt referring to Salt Mine in Wieliczka, Poland. Extending
the peculiar building technique in which 1,072 feet below the earth’s surface, the mine,
blocks of salt were taken from the nearby in operation from the thirteenth century until
saltwater lakes and adhered together with an 2007, is a World Heritage site and is often
abundant mud mortar, also very rich in salt, referred to as an underground salt cathedral.
in what is today the Siwa Oasis. Siwa is the Throughout its history, miners carved grand
only city in the world that uses this technique interior spaces, salt crystal chandeliers, and
of making blocks that are a combination of intricate reliefs of biblical scenes throughout
mud and up to 80 percent salt. Similarly, five the underground building as they excavated
hundred years later in Arabia Felix, Pliny the for table salt. The salt mine contains enor-
Elder wrote about his journey to “the city mous rooms where galas and banquets for
of Gerra, five miles in circumference, with hundreds of people can be accommodated, as

Salt
towers built of square blocks of salt” that are well as private chambers where world leaders
“adhered together with copious amount of and scientists can conduct confidential meet-
sea water.”2 The city of Taghaza, in the Afri- ings without the fear of being overheard.
can country of Mali, is also built of salt, but Other mines are similarly intriguing for
using a very different process. Workers in the their sublime salinous spaces. In Grand
enormous salt mines at Taghaza live in hous- Saline, Texas, Morton Salt mined a salt dome
es and pray in mosques constructed from that is fifty-seven stories underground and
slabs of solid salt that are roofed with camel has walls of white salt rock descending in
skins. Extreme geologic and climatic condi- silent splendor to a depth of eighty-five feet.
tions allowed for the construction of these In contrast to the towering underground
saline cities. Because of a near-absence of palace, above ground, the town hosts a
precipitation, almost no vegetation grows in small, one-story Salt Palace Museum on Main
the desert regions of Africa and Arabia. The Street. The palace is constructed of salt rock
arid climate requires builders to look else- from the mine below and is the fourth and
where for materials; the lack of rainfall in turn smallest of the salt palaces the town has
prevents the salt blocks from eroding. erected; the first three melted! In its current
Traditionally, salt was either harvest- iteration, the salt rock walls are made of salt
ed from solar evaporation ponds adjacent rubble–style masonry and are protected by 19
 Salt Hotel, Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia
Salt

overhanging eaves. The building has been the buildings in the area are constructed of
“re-salted” three times by a stonemason salt bricks cut from the crust of the salt flat.
who replaces the salt rock veneer with new The walls, domed ceilings, floors, and even
irregularly shaped salt rocks from the mine the furniture of these buildings are often
below. completely constructed of salt. The salt
More examples of salt-block buildings bricks are cut straight out of the ground in
currently exist around the world. Constructed dimensions and proportions that vary; they
at the edges of the world’s largest salt flat can be lifted and placed by hand, reminiscent
in Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia, are three hotels of the construction of an ashlar masonry
and many houses and restaurants, all made wall. Colored layers present in the cut salt
of salt blocks. The salar, an expansive salt bricks indicate the vacillation between dry
flat that covers over four thousand square seasons and rainy seasons, when sediment
miles, consists of a salt crust that varies is deposited—a natural process repeated
in thickness from a fraction of an inch to annually. The strata of sediment and salt cre-
thirty-two feet in some places. Because of ate a pattern of growth that can be seen on
the sheer abundance of salt (there are over the surface of the building itself. The layers
20 eleven billion tons in the salar), most of of salt and other sediments, coupled with
the stacking of blocks, create buildings that use of salt as a facade element demonstrates
appear in stark contrast to the vast, white how its performative properties can be ex-
planes of the expansive salt flat. ploited for their optical and thermal qualities
While salt has long been a traditional to diffuse light and store heat, making salt
material, it can be found in contemporary a contemporary energy-efficient building
architecture as well. One radical example material and technology.
of salt in architecture is its application as a Another example of contemporary salt
chemochromic smart material in glass fa- architecture is in the city of Shiraz, Iran.
cades. The technology consists of a light- An architect, Alireza Emtiaz, has transformed
directing insulation glazing system that uses salt from Maharlu Lake, just outside Shiraz,
salt as a phase-change material. It is com- into twisting sculptural forms that evoke
posed of four panes of glass, one behind a cave, to create the interior and facade of
the other, with external light-directing pris- a restaurant called Namak, the Persian word
matic plastic panels and internal transparent for salt. The contrast between the soft un-
plastic containers filled with a thin (⅝-inch) dulations of the restaurant’s facade and the
layer of calcium chloride hexahydrate. An city’s hard edges makes the restaurant stand
excellent thermal mass, the translucent apart from the surrounding buildings. Loose
salt hydrate can absorb as much heat as a salt crystals were mixed with a natural gum

Salt
sixteen-inch-thick concrete wall. The salt to make a thick coating that was sculpted
makes it possible to replace thick, opaque into the novel, doubly curved surfaces of the
walls with thin, transparent surfaces. The salt restaurant’s interior and its facade. The salty
hydrate’s melting point is between seventy finish resembles stucco, and the architecture
and eighty-six degrees, and during the evokes an urban crystalline grotto emerging
summer months, when the building interior from the city.
warms above this temperature, the salt melts The technique used to create the salt
and absorbs the thermal energy that would stucco of Namak is similar in some ways
otherwise lead to overheating. However, to the process used in 3D printing salt by
because the salt remains translucent, light Emerging Objects. In both cases, salt from
still penetrates the interior. When the outside a body of water is harvested and used in
temperature drops below the melting point, its granular form, which allows the salt to be
the molten salt begins to recrystallize, and shaped, and in both cases the salt is mixed
heat is released, warming the building interi- with environmentally friendly resinous mate-
ors during cooler evenings and nights. This rials to become strong and waterproof.

21
 3D Printing with
Salt
The Saltygloo is an experiment in 3D print- San Francisco Bay is brought into a series
ing using locally harvested salt from the San of large crystallization beds that are more
Francisco Bay to produce a large-scale, light- than a hundred years old. Over three years,
weight, additively manufactured structure. the brine evaporates, leaving five to six inch-
In the landscape of the Bay Area, five hun- es of solid crystallized salt, which is then
dred thousand tons of sea salt are produced harvested for food and industrial use. From
3D Printing with

each year, using only the sun and wind, this landscape, a new kind of salt-based
making salt a locally available sustainable architecture—created through 3D printing
building material. The salt is harvested in and computer-aided design—was realized.
Newark, California, where saltwater from the Inspired by traditional cultures that use the
Salt

22
Salt crystallization beds in
the San Francisco Bay
Ancient method of boiling
brine to produce salt

Salt
building material found directly beneath This substance makes an ideal 3D-printing

3D Printing with
their feet, such as the Inuit with their igloos, material that is strong, waterproof, light-
Emerging Objects embarked on a similar weight, translucent, and inexpensive.
process. It is named the Saltygloo because The form of the Saltygloo is drawn not
it is made of salt y glue—a combination of only from the forms found in the Inuit igloos
salt harvested from the San Francisco Bay but also the shapes and forms of tools and
and glue derived from natural materials. equipment used in the ancient process of

23
Saltygloo assembly
 24
3D Printing with Salt
Saltygloo on display at the Design Exchange
Museum in Toronto, Canada, 2015

Salt
3D Printing with

25
3D Printing with
Salt

boiling brine. Additionally, the design of

each tile is based on the microscopic forms
of crystallized salt. The 3D-printed salt
tiles that make up the surface of the Salty-
gloo—330 in total—are connected to form
a rigid shell that is further strengthened
with lightweight aluminum rods flexed in
tension, making the structure extremely
lightweight, easily transported, and able to
be assembled in only a few hours; it is in
many ways a salt tent. The material’s trans-
lucence, a product of the fabrication process
and salt’s natural properties, allows light
to permeate the enclosure and highlights
its assembly and structure, revealing the
unique qualities of one of humankind’s most
26 essential minerals.
27
3D Printing with Salt
 Salt
Objects
Salt can be 3D printed and formed into
familiar objects such as these functioning
saltshakers. Each has a solid 3D-printed
exterior, with holes printed into the top,
allowing for the loose interior salt to
be sprinkled on food. The binders and
additives in the salt formulation are edible
and nontoxic.
Salt
Objects

The GEOtube Tower is a scale model con- ronmental conditions. The world’s highest
structed as part of a proposal for a “vertical oceanic water salinity is found in the adja-
salt deposit growth system” for Dubai, cent Persian Gulf (and the Red Sea). The
designed by Faulders Studio. The model’s result is a specialized habitat for the wildlife
modular components and unique material that thrives in this environment and an ac-
formulation for 3D printing were developed cessible surface for the harvesting of crystal
and fabricated by Emerging Objects to be salt. Gravity-sprayed with the waters of the
extremely translucent and consistent with Persian Gulf, the skin of this urban sculptural
the designer’s proposal for a building con- tower is designed to be entirely grown rather
structed of salt. than constructed—in continual formation
Faulders Studio’s idea for the GEOtube rather than fully completed—and to be creat-
28 Tower was born from Dubai’s unique envi- ed locally rather than imported.
29
Salt Objects
 30
Salt Objects
The form of the Haeckel Bowl is inspired cantilever, wall thicknesses, and dimensional
by the German biologist Ernst Haeckel’s variability of the latticelike structure, which
book Die Radiolarien, published in 1862. becomes progressively thinner as it moves
Radiolarians are tiny protozoa that produce away from the center. The entire structure is
intricate mineral skeletons made of silica. very shallow—less than two inches deep—
Because silica is impervious to many acids and can be printed quickly.
that often dissolve shells, these skeletons The salt version of the Haeckel Bowl is
make up a huge proportion of the sludge translucent and glows when light passes
found on deep-sea beds. The filiform skele- through it. This material attribute is remark-
tons typically have radial symmetry and ably similar to the glasslike qualities that
are composed of ornate polyhedral lattices the deep-sea radiolaria themselves possess,
and substructures. The Haeckel Bowl is for when they are observed with an optical
printed in every Emerging Object material microscope, radiolaria are found to be low-
as a test to study strength, because of the contrast, light-scattering objects.

Objects
Salt
The Twisting Tower, 3D printed in salt,
explores vertical aggregation along with
techniques for stacking by interlocking.
Its form is composed of undercuts, twists,
and bends that make it extremely difficult
to cast.

31
Sawdust
Sawdust is composed of tiny particles that be notable, perhaps momentous. Frame
come from sanding or cutting wood. It is construction in early America stood out as
largely an industrial by-product, generated a revolutionary new paradigm in building.1
by the wood industry in sawmills and furni- Because they could be erected more quickly,
ture factories and on building construction houses using milled lumber and the balloon
sites. frame technique replaced the hand-hewn,
Sawmills have historically been the larg- heavy timber houses that previously had
est producers of sawdust. They have been in been commonplace. Balloon framing became
operation since the Middle Ages and often the standard technique of mass housing con-
were constructed near salt and iron works to struction in the nineteenth century. At that
produce fuel. In the early eighteenth century time, the United States was still a forest-rich
in North America, forests were so abundant region, and manufacturing boomed as new
that settlers moving across the country technology brought advances in the quick
would construct sawmills in the wilderness and cheap processing of wood in sawmills on
as one of their first acts when establishing a a massive scale. This rapid industrialization
town. The first frame house in a community, created extremely high levels of waste. In
built with the lumber from the sawmill, would fact, by the mid-twentieth century it was said

Sawdust

33
Sawdust waste
 Students at the University of Technology Eindhoven building
a scaled replica of the Sagrada Familia out of pykrete.
Sawdust

that sawmills were in reality “sawdust facto- was sent to the mill, new innovations ex-
ries, with a by-product of lumber.”2 ploited “wood waste” or sawdust. Ultimately,
Eventually realizing that the forest was sawdust became the driving force of the
not, indeed, limitless, engineers and inventors construction industry through engineered
began to speculate about how to be more building products such as plywood, fiber-
efficient with its resources. Whereas previ- board, and chipboard. Nevertheless, the
34 ously, as much high-quality wood as possible construction industry continues today to
generate large quantities of sawdust during novel process was invented during World
the manufacture of lumber and engineered War II by Max Perutz, who proposed using
building products, in addition to generating it to construct large, unsinkable ships and
tons of wood waste during the construction mobile offshore aircraft bases. A small-scale
and demolition of buildings. In 2013, in the prototype of a pykrete ship was fabricated
United States alone, over forty-two million in Alberta, Canada, in 1943, but the idea
tons of wood waste were generated on con- was scrapped because of the invention of
struction sites.3 If necessity is the mother of long-range fuel tanks for fighter and patrol
invention, then necessity demands that the airplanes. In 2014 students at the Eindhoven
world’s continuing supply of wood waste be University of Technology built the largest
transformed yet again. ice dome in the world out of pykrete.
Wood waste is frequently incinerated Sawdust can also be used to make wood
as fuel at large factories, but it can also be pulp for paper manufacturing. In building
ground into very fine wood flours. Wood flour construction, paper is used for sheathing and
has major industrial markets in the con- roofing; for insulation in laminated building
struction industry; for example, epoxy resins, products; and, of course, for wallpaper.
felt roofing, floor tiles, wood fillers, caulks, Repurposing wood-waste materials to

Sawdust
putties, and a vast array of wood plastics are make new wood products has contributed to
all made of wood flour. These products are a wood renaissance. One of the most visible
frequently used in the construction of build- current uses of recycled wood flour can be
ings, boats, and furniture. Additionally, wood found in wood plastic composites used for
scraps and shavings continue to be used to decking materials. The wood flour found
make building materials such as chipboard, in these composites can be produced from
fiberboard, and particleboard. locally sourced, reclaimed wood that would
Pykrete is one of the most interesting and otherwise end up in a landfill. By incorporat-
novel uses of sawdust as a building material. ing reclaimed sawdust into products, manu-
Freeze a combination of 14 percent sawdust facturers do not need to harvest additional
with 86 percent water, and the cellulose trees. Wood plastic composites are very
fibers of the wood dramatically increase the strong and easy to shape and mill. By adjust-
strength and durability of ice. Upon freezing, ing the species, size, and concentration of
pykrete is up to fourteen times stronger than wood particles in the formulation, variations
regular ice, outperforming concrete in com- in properties, such as color and strength,
pression, and melts much more slowly. This can be achieved.

35
 3D Printing with
Sawdust and Newsprint
3D printing with sawdust has some similar- fine powders and flours and used to make
ities to the manufacture of recycled engi- 3D-printed objects that have similar colors
neered wood products, but in many ways, it and properties.
is also quite different. Whereas many current The Sawdust Screen, for example, is
applications for upcycling sawdust into made of pulverized walnut shells and saw-
3D Printing with

building products use equal parts sawdust dust, and retains a layering effect from the
and polymers, our 3D-printed sawdust begins additive manufacturing process, simulating
with nearly 85 percent recycled wood and natural wood grain. The screen is composed
cellulose particles. The remaining percentage of individual 3D-printed wood components
is composed of powder-based glues acti- that are affixed together to form a variably
Sawdust

vated by water. It is only after a 3D-printed dimensional enclosure and surface. Its porous
object emerges that a polymer coating is pattern is inspired by the vessels found in
applied, which gives the printed object a a microscopic analysis of the anatomy of
materially rich texture and surface in addition hardwoods. When viewed from the end grain,
to its strength. The final color and texture is
a product of the wood species that is printed.
Pine flour produces objects lighter in color
and softer than hardwood fillers such as
maple or walnut, which can appear almost
like rusted COR-TEN steel. Surprisingly, the
layers that are a product of the additive
manufacturing process impart a grain similar
to natural wood, as if the wood wants to
return to its original state and express its
internal growth.
Sawdust isn’t the only material that
can be used to 3D print wood-like objects.
Nutshells, husks, and seeds are all agricul-
36 tural by-products that can be ground into
Digital model of
Sawdust Screen tile
 Sawdust
3D Printing with

37
Transverse wood section and Swietenia humilis
of Dalbergia retusa
3D Printing with
Sawdust

these vessels demonstrate the porosity of

wood. In a live tree, they serve as pipelines
within the trunk, a transportation system for
water and sap. In the Sawdust Screen, the
vessels serve as an opportunity for visual
porosity. The subtle curvature of each vessel
accentuates the openings as convex or
concave apertures, making the screen both
a visual and haptic experience. The Sawdust
Screen is evidence that 3D printing with
sawdust and other agricultural by-products
has the potential to transform the inherently
subtractive process—which begins with
trees and ends with dust—into an additive
process that upcycles this widely available
material into architectural components.
38
Sawdust, in addition to being a by-product when making their geometrically complex
of the construction industry, is also the paper nests.
by-product of certain animals, birds, and Paper, specifically newspaper, today
insects that live in wood, such as the is made of ground-up wood pulp. For 3D
woodpecker, wasp, and carpenter ant. It is printing, the newspaper is shredded, mixed
said that the idea of using wood to make with water, dried, and ground up into a fine
paper was inspired by observing wasps. powder mixture much like papier-mâché.
Paper wasps scrape away small particles The final product has a velvety, granular
of wood and mix them with their saliva appearance and is soft to the touch.

Sawdust
3D Printing with

39
3D-printed newsprint objects
 Sawdust
Objects Poroso is an experiment in block aggregation
using a specially formulated walnut shell
material combined with sawdust. The blocks
are double sided, with a hollow interior.
There is no front or back; each face of the
Poroso assembly is unique, allowing for a
rich, layered effect when one looks through
the wall. The patterns are designed using
the Japanese karakusa method, in which the
pattern of each tile connects to that in every
adjacent tile, creating a labyrinthine and
uninterrupted motif across the surface that
can expand with continuous variation.
Sawdust
Objects

40
The Burst Tiles demonstrate 3D printing’s
potential for variation and ornamentation.
The flowers on the tiles’ surface can have
varying degrees of openness. The petals on
the flower’s surface are parametrically con-
strained to 30-degree increments of openness,
for three unique possibilities (although they
might just as easily have been constrained
to 1 degree, for ninety possibilities). The
petals in their most open and most closed
positions develop undercuts and geometries
that would be challenging to carve using
traditional methods. Because of the complex
form and potential for unlimited variation,
3D printing is the best method for producing

Objects
these designs.

Sawdust

41
Sawdust

The Lamprocyclas Raelsanfratellis light

Objects

fixture is made of 3D-printed maple saw-

dust. The pores, or openings, in the fixture
exhibit a play of brilliance or sparkle because
of their small size. The 3D-printed wood
is translucent and glows, giving off a softer
luminescence than that of the sparkling
openings. Both the design and the material-
ity of the fixture contribute to the dual
nature of the lighting effect.

42
 Objects
Sawdust
A burl is a tree growth in which the grain has
grown in a deformed manner. It commonly
takes the form of a rounded outgrowth on a
tree trunk or branch that is filled with small
knots from dormant buds. Burls usually result
from a tree undergoing some form of stress,
such as an injury, virus, or fungus. In this
case, the burl is a product of the 3D printing
of wood, exploring the forms and dimensions
possible with wood waste as an emerging
material in additive manufacturing. Like a
burl found in nature, the Burl Bowl contains
cracks, deformations, and dense layers
of growth rings—a product of the layers of
manufacturing.

43
Sawdust

The Wood Block, designed by Anthony of recycled agricultural waste. The texture
Objects

Giannini, uses 3D-printed cellulose powder as and subtle translucency of this material give
a building material that can be mass custom- the block a warmth, texture, and luminosity
ized. The additive-layer process of binder- under certain lighting conditions, but it also
jet printing creates a grain similar to natural can appear similar to rusted COR-TEN steel.
wood, which is expressed in the curvature The Wood Block can be used to construct a
of the block. The wood material is composed curtain wall or as a customized masonry unit.

The Haeckel Bowl shown here is 3D printed

in walnut shells. Nylon fibers have been
added to the powder matrix to increase ten-
44 sile strength.
45
Sawdust Objects
Coffee, Tea,
and Wine
Coffee, tea, and wine are three of the The production and consumption of
most-consumed beverages around the world. coffee offer many opportunities to harvest
Each beverage has played a substantial waste, beginning in the field where the
role in the modern era of colonization: tea coffee beans are picked. The coffee bean
shrubs, coffee trees, and grapevines were can be found at the center of the coffee
planted by Europeans in India, Australia, and cherry (the coffee tree’s fruit). The bean
North and South America beginning in the goes through a process of drying or wash-
fifteenth century, as European migration and ing as it is separated from the cherry’s
occupation spread around the planet. These pulp and outer skin. As the bean continues
plants experienced one of the earliest mass on its path to roasting, the cherry becomes
“assisted migrations” (a deliberate relocation a waste product. It often is dumped into
to a new habitat) in the history of the world. rivers or left to rot in heaps. In 2016 the
Because of the global proliferation of these world produced 2.886 billion kilograms of
plants, and the extensive beverage indus- coffee cherry fruit and skin waste.1 In an
tries that have grown up around them, vast effort to upcycle the coffee cherry, coffee

Coffee, Tea, and Wine

amounts of agricultural waste are generated flour, made by collecting, drying, and pulver-
each year as by-products of their cultivation. izing the cherry fruit into a fine powder,

47
Spent coffee grounds
 has been developed as a new baking the fabric as an odor absorber. The end result
product. is a super-high-tech eco-fabric that can be
Another source of coffee waste lies in used for clothing or upholstery.
the industrial production of instant coffee. Similarly, the nonprofit design company
To create instant coffee, coffee must be Re-worked uses coffee waste to make furni-
first brewed and subsequently dehydrated, ture. 3 Used coffee grounds are combined with
which means that tons of spent coffee recycled waste plastics to create a compos-
grounds are produced by large producers. ite material that is durable, waterproof, and
The grounds left over after pots or cups of easy to form into sheets that can be cut and
coffee are made in restaurants, coffee milled.
shops, and homes around the world are Engineers in Melbourne, Australia, at
also significant waste. the Swinburne University of Technology, are
Coffee grounds can also be used to add using spent coffee grounds from local coffee
color and texture to other materials in the shops to develop sustainable pavement ma-
built environment. The grounds can be mixed terials for use in road construction.4 They dry
Coffee, Tea, and Wine

with vinegar to stain wood, giving it an aged the coffee grounds in an oven at 120 degrees
appearance, and used coffee grounds can Fahrenheit (50 degrees Celsius) for five days,
be mixed with ironite and oil to give concrete then sift the grounds to filter out lumps.
a brown tint. The sifted coffee grounds are mixed with
Remarkably, there is an innovative yarn rice husk ash and blast furnace slag in a 7:2:1
made of recycled coffee grounds that can ratio. (The rice husk ash is a by-product of
be knitted or woven into sustainable fabrics rice production, and the slag is a by-product
that offer enhanced odor absorption, mois- of steel production.) A liquid alkaline solution
ture control, and UV light protection.2 The is added to bind everything together. The
yarn blends coffee residue with a polymer to outcome is a coffee-ground geopolymer that
produce a coffee/plastic thread. Fabrics can leads to a cleaner environment.
be backed with the coffee-residue thread; Much like coffee, tea generates vast
they can have a microencapsulated, baked amounts of waste during its cultivation,
coffee residue applied to their surface; or brewing, and consumption processes. During
they can contain microencapsulated coffee the harvesting of tea, mature leaves are
essential oil. The material is further com- rejected and left in the field to rot, as are the
posed of a carbonized or “burned” coffee stems and stalks of the tea bushes. Later,
nanoparticle that is made by sieving coffee more waste is created when tea is refined
residue, removing organic contents from the and packaged. A by-product called “tea fluff,”
sieved mixture, and then retrieving carbon- a fine dust of broken tea leaves, accumulates
48 ized particles from the mixture to apply to on the factory floor and is discarded. Similar
Red grape pomace, also called “marc”

Coffee, Tea, and Wine

to what occurs in the production of instant known to have antibacterial and odor-killing
coffee, the manufacturing of instant tea effects.
generates mountains of recyclable brewed Pomace is the solid remains of grapes
leaves, and billions of pounds of tea leaves after the fruit has been pressed to make
are disposed of every morning in tea shops wine. It contains the skins, pulp, seeds, and
and homes around the world, creating a vast stems of the fruit. Grape pomace has tradi-
network of waste-material sources. tionally been used to produce brandies such
Recycled tea leaves have been used to as grappa, which the Italians have made
manufacture synthetic resins, which can be since around 1000 CE, but even after this
used in building applications. Upcycled tea second use, remnant material remains. Pom-
leaves are also used to create “tea boards,” ace can be used as fodder and fertilizer,
which are used to make tatami mats and but much like the coffee cherry, grape skins
plaster boards that may be used for interior and seeds are often unproductive and
insulation and as finished interior surfaces.5 remain a waste product of wine production.
These recycled-tea building products are

49
 3D Printing with
Coffee, Tea, and Wine Waste
The waste material generated by coffee, quite traditional. Before the introduction of
tea, and wine production is abundant, inex- glassware and ceramics as we know them
pensive, and readily available in almost every today, people in East Asia made drinking uten-
region of the world and is suitable for 3D sils and vessels out of agricultural fibers and
3D Printing with

printing. What’s more, the 3D-printed objects resin—what we commonly know as lacquer-
made of these materials have unique visual ware. The production of lacquerware has been
and aromatic properties that emerge from ongoing for over ten thousand years, since
their material origins. Pieces 3D printed from the Neolithic era.6 Lacquered vessels are very
Coffee, Tea, and Wine

coffee possess a dark, rich umber color that light and are typically woven of fine strips of
patinas and darkens as it ages. Black tea bamboo wrapped around a wood mold. The
produces a reddish, tawny tone. The skins bamboo strips are then coated with sap ob-
from different grape varietals produce differ- tained from tree bark. The vessels are allowed
ent colors as well, ranging from chardonnay,
which creates a rich brunette color, to caber-
net sauvignon, which is almost black like
the raisin it was destined to become if left to
dry. Coffee, tea, and wine aromas emanate
from the 3D-printed objects themselves,
and they retain the scent of their raw mate-
rial for an exceptionally long time, especially
coffee and tea.
We have created a series of material
formulations with the by-products of coffee,
tea, and wine production for 3D printing and
fashioned “meta” drinking utensils including
a teapot, teacups, coffee cups, ice bucket,
and wine goblets. And while it may seem
novel and rarified to make drinking utensils
50 out of agricultural materials, it is, in fact,
 Coffee, Tea, and Wine
to harden before they are finished with a The by-products of coffee, tea, and wine
mix of calcined bone dust, pulverized rice are sourced or pulverized into a fine pow-
husks, and teak sawdust. der and fiber for 3D printing. Other organic

3D Printing with
The technique of using broken-down and materials are introduced into the matrix that
pulverized agricultural materials strength- adhere together when the jetted binder is
ened with a resinous material was employed sprayed to solidify the objects in the printer’s
to make many of the oldest drinking utensils, build bed. The solid printed vessels are then
especially teacups, and remarkably, it is sim- coated and infused with a food-safe epoxy,
ilar to how these materials can be combined resulting in a collection of sustainable and
to make 3D-printed drinking and serving beautiful vessels made from the ingredients
utensils today. that they serve.

51
 Coffee, Tea, and Wine
Objects
The Utah Teapot, also known as the Newell Teapot for decades remained trapped in its
Teapot, was one of the first objects ever translation from physical object to virtual
depicted as a three-dimensional object in object; through 3D printing we have liberated
the computer. Created in 1975 by the pioneer the object from the screen. While the origi-
computer graphics researcher Martin Newell nal teapot was ceramic, its translation to the
at the University of Utah, this humble teapot physical manifested in a teapot 3D printed
has become a standard reference object in out of actual tea! It would not make sense
the computer graphics community. The Utah to have a teapot without teacups. These
Coffee, Tea, and Wine
Objects

52
 Objects
Coffee, Tea, and Wine
teacups, naturally, are also printed from
tea. Furthermore, if you have a teapot and
teacups, an obvious necessity would be tea-
spoons! Of course, the Tea Spoons are also
printed using tea and hold exactly the volume
of a single teaspoon (4.92 cubic centimeters),
two teaspoons, and a tablespoon. Therefore
the Utah Tea Set is printed from a meta-
material, and the object is doubly self-
referential—meta—and then meta again.

53
Martin Newell’s drawing of the Utah Teapot
Coffee, Tea, and Wine
Objects

The Sugar Teaspoons are 3D printed

in sugar and also sized by volume with
several quantities available—1 teaspoon,
2 teaspoons, ½ teaspoon—depending
on your preference, since these sugar
teaspoons can be stirred down and
54 dissolved into one’s tea or coffee cup.
The Coffee Coffee Cups and saucers are
3D printed from upcycled coffee grounds.
The grounds are finely pulverized, held
together with a water-based binder, and
formed into cups as part of the meta-material
series of objects. Over time, the cups patina
to a rich dark brown, reminiscent of the
aroma they exude.

Objects
Coffee, Tea, and Wine

55
 56
Coffee, Tea, and Wine Objects
57
Coffee, Tea, and Wine Objects
 A goblet is a drinking cup with a foot and
a stem, typically filled with wine and used
during special occasions. Throughout history,
goblets have been made of many different
materials—earthenware, gold, silver, and
glass. Continuing the meta-material series,
these Chardonnay Wine Goblets are printed
from upcycled chardonnay grape skins and
seeds. The skins and seeds are collected
from vineyards in Sonoma County, dried in
a kiln, and pulverized to the consistency
of flour. Both the wine and the goblets them-
selves can be studied for color, viscosity,
texture, notes, and body.
Coffee, Tea, and Wine
Objects

58
Manufactured using chardonnay grape
skins as the 3D-printing material, the Marc
Metamorphosis ice bucket was designed
by Andrew Kudless/Matsys for Perrier-Jouët
and fabricated by Emerging Objects. It is
composed of seven leaves that rotate around
a central circular base. The pattern on the
tiles of the ice bucket references the wrin-
kled skin of a raisin, so that the ice bucket
reproduces the texture of a grape as it dries,
creating a beautiful and meaningful textured
surface tied directly to the wine-making
process.

Objects
Coffee, Tea, and Wine

59
 An ombré occurs where there is a smooth
transition from dark to light or one color to
another. The Ombré Decanters are part of
a series of experiments that examine material
ombrés. A material ombré creates a smooth
and seamless transition from an agricultural
material to a geologic material without joints
or fasteners. The Ombré Decanters demon-
strate a graduation from 3D-printed chardon-
nay to 3D-printed cement.
Coffee, Tea, and Wine
Objects

60
 Excavation of Ombré Decanters

The forms of the decanters are inspired

by ancient ceramic wine carafes and ampho-
rae, and the surface textures are inspired
by the diamond-pressed texture frequently
found in wine glasses and decanters.
Cement is sometimes used in vinification
culture. Wine can be fermented in concrete
vats; because of its thermal mass, concrete
allows wine to ferment at a slower pace to
retain the flavor of the fruit. The concrete’s
porosity allows the vats to breathe, naturally
fermenting the wine. The oldest fermentation
vats from ancient Greece and Rome were

Objects
made of ceramic materials; thus, the return
of cement-based materials for the storage

Coffee, Tea, and Wine

and serving of wine is a look backward and
forward at the same time.

61
Rubber
Automobile tires are one of the planet’s agents. These different materials are layered
biggest waste problems. In fact, the world’s and bonded together to create a product
largest tire graveyard, in Kuwait, is so vast that is flexible, airtight, watertight, and far
that it contains over seven million tires and is more resistant to abrasion than steel. Almost
visible from outer space.1 Worldwide, almost no other material in the world can claim this
one billion tires are discarded annually—and kind of robustness.
290 million of them come from the United Natural rubber comes from mature rubber
States alone. In the United States, about 80 trees, Hevea brasiliensis, which are grown
percent of these tires are recycled, but that largely on plantations in tropical regions
still leaves 60 million tires heading to the around the world. Originally, rubber could be
landfill every year.2 Discarded tires are ex- found only in the Brazilian Amazon rain­forest
tremely problematic because of their inability and was first called cauchu, or “weeping
to degrade and the fact that they contain wood.” The Olmec, who inhabited this region,
components that are environmentally damag- were the first to harvest rubber—the name
ing. Tires are made of five main ingredients: Olmec literally means “rubber people.”3 The
natural rubber, synthetic rubber, carbon Olmec were the first civilization to develop a
black (a material produced by the incomplete sport using a rubber ball, and depictions of

Rubber
combustion of heavy-petroleum products the game date back 3,500 years.4 Rubber was
such as coal tar), metallic and textile rein- used for making sandals, for waterproofing
forcement cable, and numerous chemical cloth, and for making drumstick ends, and
was also burned as incense and used as glue.
By the end of the eighteenth century, the
dawn of the Industrial Revolution, rubber had
become one of the world’s foremost indis-
pensable commodities. It was used to make
waterproof fabric, airtight hot-air balloons,
and rubber hoses, as well as a vast array
of other products, but it still had its prob-
lems. The material had a terrible odor, and
if warmed too much it became gooey, and in
cold temperatures it became brittle and hard.
In 1839 the technological genius Charles
Goodyear radically transformed industrial
rubber. He innovated a process to “vulcanize”
rubber (named after Vulcan, the ancient
Roman god of fire) by mixing it with sulfur at 63
Tire landfill
 high temperatures. This process profoundly composed chiefly of a petroleum by-product,
changed the material’s properties, enabling butadiene. Today 70 percent of rubber used
it to withstand extreme heat and cold, as in manufacturing is synthetic,7 and about 60
well as eliminating its noxious smell. This percent of the rubber used in the modern tire
invention opened the door for rubber to be is synthetic.8
used in many new ways, including in the Rubber is frequently used in the construc-
production of tires. tion of buildings, and increasingly recycled
Pneumatic tires were first invented in rubber is being developed for products for
1887 by John Boyd Dunlop, for his son’s the construction industry, including rubber
tricycle. Another keen cyclist, a Frenchman O-rings, gaskets, foamed insulation, bearings,
named Édouard Michelin, tried Dunlop’s tires and silicone beads to make watertight seals.
on a bicycle ride from Paris to Rouen and Recycled rubber tires are also used
adopted the pneumatic tire for use on motor in building construction, both formally and
vehicles, thus creating the single largest informally. For example, the architects Vaillo
market for raw rubber.5 By the early 1900s + Irigaray in Navarro, Spain, have made
American companies such as the Goodyear recycled rubber tire gabions into an office
Tire & Rubber Company and the Firestone building facade that allows for the passage
Rubber

Tire & Rubber Company were using millions of dappled light into the building interior,
of tons of natural rubber to make tires. How- and the Israeli pavilion in the 2015 Venice
ever, at the onset of World War II, the United Biennale was clad in recycled rubber tires.
States was cut off from the natural rubber Both show how tires can be used as building
supply of Southeast Asia, which accounted materials by designers who are simultane-
for 90 percent of production. This caused ously addressing aesthetics and environmen-
the United States to embark on a journey to tal issues. Discarded rubber tires are also
create an inexpensive synthetic rubber, used to make crude “earthships”—buildings
building on experiments already taking place constructed of stacked rubber tires filled
in Europe and Russia. In 1941 the Standard Oil with rammed earth to stabilize the tires
Company of New Jersey, Firestone, Goodrich, against movement and to serve as a thermal
Goodyear, and the United States Rubber mass. The stacked-tire walls are often
Company signed a patent- and information- stuccoed to conceal the fact that the earth-
sharing agreement under the supervision ship is made of recycled tires.
of the Rubber Reserve Corporation, founded Recycled rubber tires can also be used
by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.6 The to make refined building products such as
new synthetic rubber, engineered under floor tiles, carpet padding, roofing tiles, and
the Rubber Reserve Corporation’s oversight waterproof membranes. Most recycled rubber
64 and jointly by its member corporations, is products are made of rubber crumb. A com-
Recycled tire gabions in the Etxesakan 5. Edificio
Bidekoa Offices, designed by Vaillo + Irigaray

Rubber
mon way to manufacture rubber crumb is to
freeze chipped tire pieces in a bath or shower
of liquid nitrogen. At –80 degrees Celsius the
rubber becomes as brittle as glass, and the
frozen rubber is pulverized using a hammer
mill. This process reduces the rubber to
particles ranging from ¼ inch to 600 microns.
Cryogenic grinding avoids heat degradation
of the rubber and produces a high yield of
product that is free of almost all fiber or
steel, which is extracted during the process
using magnets and screens. The resulting
material is shiny and clean—a raw material,
ready to be transformed into something new.

65
 3D Printing with
Rubber
The Emerging Objects rubber used for 3D
printing is ground into even finer particle
sizes that are as small as 50 microns.9 The
rubber powder is inert and therefore is mixed
with other additives to make it printable; the
3D Printing with

mixture is adhered together with an organic

binder. Thus, through 3D printing, end-of-life
tires can be transformed into high-value sus-
tainable products for the built environment,
such as outdoor furniture, embossed rubber
Rubber

flooring, and custom tiles for wall cladding.

66
67
3D Printing with Rubber
 Rubber The Rubber Pouf is a playful piece of
furniture that can be used as a low seat or

Objects footstool. Its form resembles a six-pointed

star with rounded heads on the ends of
all six points. The pouf is printed in eight
parts that are adhered together to make
one solid object. The detailed, beveled
texture on the pouf’s surface gives the
appearance of button tufting, which makes
the piece look padded and soft and
contributes to its overall materiality and
playful quality.
Rubber
Objects

Large and small Rubber Poufs, printed

68 out of recycled rubber tires
69
Rubber Objects
 The Haeckel Bowl was one of the first
objects 3D printed in rubber. One of the
most exciting aspects of 3D printing
with rubber is that the rubber particles
retain their pliability.
Rubber
Objects

70
71
Rubber Objects
Bioplastic
Bioplastic, a synthetic material made from handles were crafted from this earth/man-
organic polymers, has been used in the built made plastic. Parkesine’s successor was
environment for thousands of years. For celluloid, the material that transformed the
example, natural plant gum was traditionally film industry. Celluloid is considered the
used as a wood glue in the construction of first thermoplastic because of its ability to
houses, and in early oceanic exploration, nat- be easily molded and shaped into any form:
ural plant gum was applied as a waterproof filmstrips, phones, toys, jewelry, and furniture
coating to boats. However, natural plant are just a few examples of how this transfor-
resins were never chemically modified until mative material has been used.
Charles Goodyear vulcanized rubber in 1839, In the early 1900s synthetic polymers
thus creating the first man-made biopolymer.1 were developed, and there are now hundreds
Patented in 1857, Parkesine was the of thousands of them in use. Synthetic
first commercial-grade man-made plastic. It plastics are strong, cheap to produce, and
was made from cellulose, a wood fiber, which lightweight, and can seemingly last forever.
was treated with nitric acid and a solvent Unfortunately, the attributes that make plas-
to create what is known as “synthetic ivory.” tics so popular are also the ones that make
Objects such as combs, buttons, and cutlery them so problematic. It is estimated that the

Bioplastic

73
Corn harvest for bioplastic production
 The Laban Dance Centre by Herzog & de Meuron
Bioplastic

world produces almost three hundred billion releases carbon dioxide into the air,
tons of plastic a year, and only 10 percent contributing to global warming, and most
of that is recycled.2 Much of it ends up as oil-based plastics take hundreds, if not
floating junkyards in our ocean’s gyres, thousands, of years to degrade. For example,
as litter on our streets, and in landfill. Plastic a credit card will take almost exactly one
pollution is a serious issue worldwide; the hundred years to degrade, compared
74 production of plastic from oil-based materials with an apple core, which takes only three
months.3 Ideally, all plastic products need transformed into innocuous lactic acid in
to degrade naturally at the end of their life the body in a time frame between six months
and not cause adverse effects to the environ- and two years. Outside your body, PLA can
ment. The use of cellulose-based materials, break down in forty-five days in a compost-
rather than nonrenewable crude oil–derived ing facility. However, under stable environ-
materials, has proved to be an important mental conditions, it takes hundreds of years
solution for creating plastics with a low to biodegrade, which means that it shows
environmental footprint. promise as a long-term building material
Polylactic acid (PLA) is a bioplastic in applications where temperatures are not
derived from renewable resources such as excessively hot.
cornstarch, tapioca roots, and sugarcane; Plastics are frequently used in construc-
it is biodegradable. PLA was discovered in tion. One can find plastic pipes, insulation,
the 1800s and was designated a prepolymer window frames, roofing, screws, hinges, floor-
(a polymer that has undergone a partial ing, wall coverings, waterproofing, and even
chemical reaction but could in fact be further plastic doors in almost every building. We
manipulated because of its low production don’t always see the plastic parts of build-
and low purity values). Today, PLA is one ings, as they are sometimes hidden (e.g., in

Bioplastic
of the most widely produced, biodegradable the foam core of a door), but buildings today
plastics made with renewable materials. are increasingly made of plastic. In some
It is principally made of carbon, oxygen, and buildings, plastic is celebrated as the building
hydrogen, so as it degrades or is incinerated, material. The Laban Dance Centre in London,
it releases only those elements into the designed by Herzog & de Meuron, is clad with
atmosphere or the soil. PLA can be used for plastic panels made of impact-resistant poly-
extrusion, injection molding, film and sheet carbonate, and the Eden Project, designed
casting, and spinning, which means there by Grimshaw Architects, is a series of domes
are many ways to turn this material into covered with inflated plastic pillows made of
products. It is also one of the most common ethylene tetrafluoroethylene, or ETFE, which
feedstock materials used in desktop 3D is corrosion resistant and very strong, even in
printers today. response to temperature fluctuations. These
For decades PLA has been used primar- projects from the turn of the twenty-first
ily in biomedical applications—for bones, century that embrace the use of plastic as
screws, plates, pins, and meshes—because a cladding material have paved the way for
it is a bioreabsorptive material that is bioplastic buildings of the future.

75
 3D Printing with
Bioplastic
Branch Technology, based in Tennessee, machine capable of 3D printing components
recently 3D printed a large bioplastic struc- up to twenty by eight by six feet. This device
ture for Design Miami 2016 called “Flotsam has produced the largest 3D-printed object
and Jetsam.” The structure was printed in the world to date—a trim-and-drill tool
using KUKA robot arms and PLA made from that weighs 1,650 pounds, to be used in the
3D Printing with

bamboo. The Amsterdam-based architec- production of Boeing airplanes.

ture firm DUS Architects is building a Canal The cellulose-based materials that go into
House from biodegradable plastic parts PLA include an ever-widening range. It is now
that are entirely 3D printed, then filled with possible to 3D print with PLA made not only
a lightweight foamed concrete to provide of cornstarch but also hemp, bamboo, and
Bioplastic

structural reinforcement. The Canal House barley. Additionally, materials such as coffee,
is being printed on a machine called the glass, and powdered metals can be added to
Kamermaker, quite literally “room maker,” a PLA to give it special properties, including
room-size printer that extrudes PLA pellets color, strength, and sheen, respectively. Dyes
into forms that are up to nine feet tall. Oak can also be added to the PLA filament to
Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee has offer a wide range of colors that are integral
a Big Area Additive Manufacturing (BAAM) to the material.

76
 Bioplastic
Emerging Objects fabricated one of the

3D Printing with
largest PLA-based 3D-printed structures
built to date, the Star Lounge. The freestand-
ing, doubly curved dome is eight feet, six
inches tall, with a footprint that measures
about eleven by eleven feet. The dome is
composed of 2,073 hexagonal blocks printed
in twenty-eight translucent colors; each color
corresponds to one particular block type.
This helps simplify the construction process
and also creates a beautiful, yet logical,
pattern of twenty-one stars and hexagons in
an assembly of twenty-one larger panels
that are riveted together. The pattern is
inspired by cut-tile Arabic star motifs and
mid-nineteenth-century American star quilts.
The color-coded facade is an aesthetic 77
Arabic tile star pattern
 78
3D Printing with Bioplastic
 Star Lounge assembly

choice but also encodes the instructions

for fabrication and assembly. In addition
to the color coding, each block has a number
printed on its interior surface to locate it
within the overall dome.
The Star Lounge is unique among
large-scale 3D-printed structures in that it
demonstrates the architectural potential of
using a farm of small, inexpensive desktop
printers. The hexagonal blocks that make up
the large panels were printed using a “bot
farm” of over one hundred 3D printers. The
design of each individual component max-
imizes the efficiency of the printer and the
print volume. Two blocks could be printed
per printer without support material in just
over an hour. Holes for rivets were also

Bioplastic
printed into the blocks. The Star Lounge
demonstrates that prefabricating small-scale,
hand-size, efficiently designed 3D-printed

3D Printing with
parts for architectural assembly is feasible
and cost-effective. This process opens the
door to creating 3D-printed bricks, tiles,
walls, ceilings, partitions, and cladding for a
sustainable architecture of the future.

79
 Bioplastic
Objects
Bioplastic
Objects

Starlight is the experimental precursor to Starlight is that the geometry of the Starlight
the Star Lounge. Building on the knowledge extends beyond the ball to make stunning,
generated in the Romanesco studies, it light-filled cones. The pictured Starlight is
combines the intention of creating a spher- 3D printed in PLA mixed with fine aluminum
ical structure out of the minimum number particles to give it luster and reflectivity.
of parts with that of generating diffuse light A fine-woven mesh generated by the
through woven patterns created by custom G-code creates a loopy, textile-like surface
G-code. The Starlight comprises twenty with a soft texture. The object glows because
hexagons and twelve pentagons and is a of the translucency of the material but also
buckminsterfullerene, or “buckyball.” The permits direct light to shine through the sur-
80 difference between a buckyball and the face of the cone itself.
Back of Picoroco Wall,
showing 3D-printed PLA clips

Objects
Bioplastic
The Picoroco Wall is constructed using
the Picoroco Block, a 3D-printed building
block for modular wall fabrication printed in
translucent orange PLA. The wall comprises
blocks with a dimension of 5.75 by 5.75 by
2.75 inches. Three different blocks, with two,
three, or four holes, are used in the construc-
tion of the wall. Each block can be rotated
randomly to create the variable pattern found
in the wall. The blocks are held in place with
3D-printed orange PLA clips, which have
four prongs that connect the blocks at the
corners. The wall takes advantage of the
translucency of the bioplastic, giving it a
softly scalloped, diaphanous quality when
light filters through.
81
 82
Bioplastic Objects
83
Bioplastic Objects
 84
Bioplastic Objects
These study models, called Romanescos,
are the first experiments conducted by
Emerging Objects using customized G-code
(the computer language that directs a 3D
printer) to inform the surface texture of
a 3D-printed object. By controlling each line
of filament, we are able to take these lines
for a walk in a zigzag, sawtooth, sine wave,
or step pattern. The repetition, offsetting,
cycling, and amplitude of the line create
unique and often porous textile-like surfaces
using a minimum amount of material.

Objects
Bioplastic

85
 The Hut Was Never Primitive is a series
of conceptual study models for houses.
They explore how G-code can act as the
mediator between machine and archi-
tecture, interior and exterior, and wall
and ceiling. The Hut Was Never Primitive
conceptualizes the most fundamental
components of 3D-printed architecture
—wall, floor, roof—and foretells its
emergence. Each hut explores surface,
texture, material, form, space, light,
color, and shadow and serves as a point
of reference for speculation about the
essentials of 3D printing buildings.
G-code, slicing, customization, hacking,
and parametrics represent some of the
first strategies for 3D printing a house;
Bioplastic

the techniques used in the 3D-printed

huts build on technologies that have
been in development for ten thousand
Objects

years of human civilization, such as

puddling, rusticating, embossing, shag-
ging, vermiculating, and thatching,
all of which have the potential to be
reinterpreted through the lens of addi-
tive manufacturing.

86
87
Bioplastic Objects
 The Chroma Curl Wall references tradi- and sculptural surface, which might from
tional pressed-tin walls and ceilings from a distance resemble molded plaster or
the Victorian era. In the late-nineteenth and pressed tin but in reality is something en-
twentieth centuries in North America and tirely new. The digital nature of 3D printing
Australia, pressed-tin tiled ceilings were a allows each tile in a wall to be uniquely pat-
popular alternative to the exquisite plaster- terned and shaped. It is therefore no longer
work one could find in Europe. Sheets of necessary to make expensive molds that
tin were stamped one at a time using cast- can produce only one tile design. The
iron molds, and were often painted white to 3D-printed bioplastic Chroma Curl Wall is
give the appearance of hand-carved or mold- opaque when washed with light from the
ed plaster. The sheets were used as ceilings room interior during the day, but at night,
and wainscoting on walls, with the designs color-changing LED lights backlight the
embedded in each sheet repeated across translucent bioplastic and the wall becomes
the surface to form an intricate pattern. luminous, taking on the color of the light
Through 3D printing, we are able to behind it and animating a surface that trans-
achieve the same effect of a highly intricate forms chromatically and texturally.
Bioplastic
Objects

88
89
Bioplastic Objects
 The first damasks used a satin-weaving woven and printed fabrics more affordable
technique to create areas of different sheens for the growing middle class. Later, during
in a cloth, revealing raised animal and the Arts and Crafts movement—whose
botanical patterns. Because it was a three- advocates saw machine-made designs as
dimensional weave, the textile was always inferior and dishonest—damasks were once
reversible. Traditionally, damask textiles again handcrafted, often depicting stylized
were always monochromatic; patterns were images of plant and animal life.
distinguished by the way light played off Over the last century, the definition of
the warp (vertical) and weft or (horizontal) damask has expanded to include fabrics
filaments. Some damasks even look different made with two or three colors and other
depending on the time of day. filaments, such as cotton and wool. Even
Damask was invented in China around more recently, patterns that are 2D printed
300 BCE. These richly woven textiles were to look like damask have been considered
traded along the Silk Road, which stretched “damask,” but these, of course, are not re-
from the Far East to the Mediterranean, and versible, and they are not three-dimensional.
may have gotten their name from Damascus, The three-dimensionality and reversibility
one of the cities merchant caravans passed of the original damask, however, have been
Bioplastic

through en route to Europe. Damasks have revived through 3D printing using new
had a long-standing status as a luxury fabric filament: PLA. The 3D-printed PLA Damask
because they were originally made of silk Wall is also quite rigid and strong. The
Objects

filament, which was very expensive. In the pattern or motif gives the fabric structure
1700s, at the height of their popularity, and rigidity, embedding new functionality.
damask patterns could be found on walls, The pattern or motif is not merely applied
furniture, and curtains filling entire domestic to the surface of a wall or a piece of fur-
interiors of the wealthy. The Industrial Rev- niture but literally becomes the wall or the
olution ushered in mass production, making furniture itself.

90
91
Bioplastic Objects
 92
Bioplastic Objects
93
Bioplastic Objects
 94
Bioplastic Objects
Hair, fur, and fibers have long been incor- year-old artist Salvador Dalí if he had any
porated in architecture as textural elements. thoughts on the future of architecture.
Flocking can be traced back to circa 1000 Dalí retorted, with some disdain (as he
BCE, when the Chinese used resin glue to viewed Le Corbusier as the inventor of the
bond natural fibers to fabrics. Fiber dust was architecture of self-punishment because
strewn onto adhesive-coated surfaces to of his use of harsh concrete forms), that the
produce flocked wall coverings in Germany architecture of the future would be “soft
during the Middle Ages, and in France, and hairy.” Hairline Drawing explores the
flocked wall coverings became popular use of custom G-code scripting for 3D
during the reign of Louis XIV. Nomadic cul- printing to create a surface not unlike a
tures today continue to gather camel and technological flocking or a bioplastic weav-
yak hair, either by shearing or combing; ing. The drawing depicts Notre Dame du
these fibers are felted or woven to create a Haut, a work where, perhaps influenced by
durable textile for tents. Dalí, Le Corbusier expressly sought to deny

Objects
If architecture can be hairy, how might the machine-age aesthetic of his previous
we draw hairy drawings? In 1925 the architect work—a return to the soft, drawn here with
Le Corbusier asked the then twenty-one- a 3D printer as hairy.

Bioplastic
The Notre Dame du Haut,
Hairline Drawing

95
Sand
Natural sands are eroded or weathered Sand is found in every country of the
particles of rocks. Sand is made by simply world and is used to make the most mundane
grinding up rocks into increasingly smaller and the most technologically advanced
pieces, and glaciers do it best. Sand can products, from toothpaste to microchips.
also be made out of living creatures, from Sand is a material in flux, blowing in the wind
shells and other organisms of the living and creating shifting sand dunes, but it is
world, and many beaches are composed of also an important global commodity on which
pulverized animal shells. Sand grains can nations are built. For example, Singapore is
originate from catastrophic geologic phe- 22 percent larger today than it was in the
nomena, as when molten lava erupts from 1950s because billions of metric tons of sand
volcanoes and shatters in the air, scattering have been added to the existing island since
particles across the oceans to land as tiny that time. Singapore is planning to expand
grains. This black volcanic sand can be its territory by another fifteen thousand
found throughout the world, as on the black acres over the next fifteen years.2 However,
beaches of Hawai‘i. But by far, most sand the increase in size of one nation means
grains are made of quartz, one of the earth’s the decrease of another. In Indonesia, some
most common ingredients, and are formed two dozen islands have disappeared since
every single day, on every exposed piece of 2005 because of sand mining—largely by

Sand
land, by the process of weathering.1 Singapore.3

97
 3D Printing with
Sand
The writer Jorge Luis Borges declared, casting. Molten metal is poured into the
“Nothing is built on stone; all is built on sand, 3D-printed silica sand molds to produce
but we must build as if the sand were stone.”4 automotive and aerospace components such
And we do. Sand is one of the most import- as engine blocks and airplane propellers.
ant aggregate materials for the building and Another example of 3D printing with sand
construction industry. Wet sand is workable; can be found in Markus Kayser’s desert Solar
3D Printing with

it can be combined with water, gravel, and Sinter project.5 This example is exciting from
portland cement to be transformed into one a technological standpoint and also from
of the most durable and most ubiquitous a material resource perspective because
building materials in the world: concrete. most sand being mined for the construction
When water is mixed with sand, its properties industry does not come from deserts. Desert
Sand

change remarkably; the two fluids become a sand particles are round; therefore, they
formable solid, and very little liquid is need- don’t closely pack and so are less desirable
ed to make this happen. That’s the reason in concrete construction. In Kayser’s project
3D printing with sand and other sand-size two elements dominate: sun and sand. The
material is possible. There is enough surface sun offers a vast, free, and powerful energy
tension between the liquid and the particle source of huge potential; desert sand (silica
to make them neighborly and stick together. in the form of quartz) is unlimited in supply.
Sand is found in fluvial riverbeds and Silica sand, when heated to melting point
floodplains, shorelines, deserts, and dunes, and allowed to cool, solidifies as glass. The
as well as man-made sites that include mines process of converting silica via heat into
and quarries. Sand is everywhere and has a solid form is known as sintering and has in
the potential to be a valuable local material recent years become a central process in
resource for 3D printing, especially sands the design prototyping known as selective
that are not currently being used in construc- laser sintering (SLS). SLS printers use laser
tion or for reclamation. technology to create extremely precise 3D
In the context of 3D printing, sand is objects from a variety of powdered plastics
most commonly used in large-volume printers and metals—and in the case of Kayser, sand.
98 that produce sand molds for industrial metal By using the sun’s rays instead of a laser and
Detail of Earthscrapers, showing
nylon fibers in sand print

Sand
sand instead of plastic, Kayser has invented constructed, quite literally, from the ground

3D Printing with
the basis of an entirely new solar-powered beneath their inhabitants’ feet. For example,
machine and production process that takes buildings are made of salt in the Salar de
advantage of the abundant supplies of sun Uyuni in South America (see chapter 1),
and sand found in the world’s deserts. The igloos made of ice are built on the frozen
objects that he prints with large particles of seas and across the arctic tundra, and build-
desert sand have a gritty, rough texture that ings made of earth exist in arid landscapes
connects them to their material source; they in many regions around the world.
aren’t simply white and smooth like most The automation of this method of build-
resin SLS prints, which seem to have no con- ing is imminent, and we imagine a scenario
nection to context, material, or culture. where a mobile 3D printer roves across the
Emerging Objects innovated binder-jet landscape, scooping up local sand, pumping
sand 3D printing to imagine future architec- it through a nozzle, and organizing it into
tural landscapes where the building and its contours and forms that become the building
material source are seamless. This is not blocks and walls for a new paradigm of archi-
a new concept; it is possible to find commu- tecture. The sand is mixed with an organic
nities all over the world where buildings are liquid binder, causing the particles to stick 99
 together to form a new kind of sandstone, anthropogenic locations where processes
a strong and local building material that that shape the landscape could provide
doesn’t require intense energy usage or the the material sources, sites, and contexts for
transportation of industrial materials around the forms and spaces created. A roving 3D
the world. printer could be controlled by a designer
Earthscrapers imagines a world where in situ or remotely. Acquiring information
3D-printed sand is a scalable technology— directly from a CAD file, the designer could
one that dissolves the distinct professions make changes to 3D-printed sand as it is
of designer and builder. In Earthscrapers, being deposited. Using sand for 3D printing
which we exhibited at the 2010 Biennial of proposes a future where designer, builder,
the Americas, we conceptualized how sites and geomorphologist merge—a landscape
of mining, desertification, dredging, and where the earth is architecture and the
erosion are a few of the many natural and architecture is earth.
3D Printing with
Sand

100
3D-printed Earthscrapers installation
at the Biennale of the Americas in
Denver, Colorado, 2010

Sand
3D Printing with

101
 3D-printed sand
architectural model
3D Printing with
Sand

102
103
3D Printing with Sand
 3D-printed sand
custom masonry units
3D Printing with
Sand

104
105
3D Printing with Sand
 106
3D Printing with Sand
 3D-printed sand
architectural model

Sand
3D Printing with

107
 Sand
Objects
By using 3D-printed building components, earthquake-resistant than using mortar.
we can create seismically resistant struc- The interlocking structure of the dry-stone
tures that use masonry principles to diffuse walls built by the Incas could move slightly
the force of an earthquake through the inter- during an earthquake and resettle without
locking components of a wall or column. collapsing, a passive structural control
The Quake Column draws from traditional technique using both the principle of energy
Incan ashlar masonry techniques to explore dissipation and that of suppressing resonant
this possibility. Peru is geologically un- amplifications. Inca walls also tend to incline
stable, and for centuries the mortar-free inward by three to five degrees, and their
construction appears to have been more corners are rounded, which contributes to
Sand
Objects

108
Incan stone wall
 Objects
Sand
their stability. Each “stone” that makes up
the Quake Column interlocks perfectly with
neighboring blocks. Whereas the cyclopean
blocks of Incan construction are massive
and weigh several tons, the 3D-printed
blocks are comparatively lightweight and
hollow. Each block is numbered to designate
its place in the construction sequence.
Additionally, each massive, 3D-printed stone
has a built-in handle for easy lifting, control,
and placement.

109
Quake Column at the 2014 3D Printer
World Expo in Los Angeles, CA
 The Involute Wall is a prototype for the study
of thermal mass and acoustic dampening in
a massive 3D-printed sand structure. The
involuted surfaces reduce resonance in the
room by absorption and redirection of sound
waves. The enormous, six-hundred-pound
3D sand print permits surfaces to serve as
thermal mass while keeping much of the wall
in shade—ideal for hot climates with extreme
temperature shifts.
Sand
Objects

110
 Involute Wall at the 2014 3D Printer
World Expo in Los Angeles, California

Objects
Sand

111
 112
Sand Objects
The Picoroco Block is a modular building
block for wall fabrication that is 3D printed
in sand. Each block is a twelve-inch cube
in this permutation; dimensional variability
is possible using the 3D-printing process.
The joints between the blocks become
invisible because of the porous pattern that
rotates along their surface. This allows for
a seemingly continuous surface, even though
the wall is modular. The back of the wall
clearly expresses the joints and the under-
lying geometry of the design.

Objects
Sand

113
Cement
The word concrete comes from the Latin discovery in 1414 of manuscripts describing
word concretus, meaning compact or con- those forgotten methods rekindled interest in
densed and grown together. The most basic building with concrete.
recipe for concrete comprises aggregates It wasn’t until the late 1700s, however, that
of various sizes that form a compact mass, the technology took a big leap forward. In 1744
portland cement, and water. When combined John Smeaton rediscovered concrete in En-
with aggregate and water, the portland gland by mixing hydraulic lime and powdered
cement crystallizes and fuses the matrix brick as aggregate for the Eddystone Light-
into a synthetic stone. house in Devon. Smeaton’s mixtures produced
The development of concrete has evolved concrete with a comprehensive strength com-
for over two thousand years. The Romans parable to the basic mixes that we use today,
were among the first to build with concrete, and his recipe for hydraulic lime became what
using a mix of quicklime, volcanic ash, and is known as portland cement. Around the same
rubble for structures such as the Pantheon. time, in France, attempts were being made
After the fall of the Roman Empire in 476 CE, to improve traditional rammed earth by intro-
the techniques for making concrete were ducing cements and limes into the compaction
lost for almost a thousand years, until the of soil between formwork.

Cement

115
Cement factory
 Concrete became a common building build a wall eighty-nine feet high and eighty-
material in Europe in the late nineteenth nine feet wide around the equator.2 From 2011
century and was pushed into prominence by to 2013 China used more concrete than the
engineers such as François Hennebique, who United States used in the entire twentieth
pioneered reinforced concrete by introduc- century. 3 It is estimated that ten billion tons
ing metal to the technology to increase its of concrete are produced worldwide each
tensile strength. By the twentieth century, year, which translates to two tons of concrete
concrete had become a global material— per person per year in the United States.
generic and normalized, and used in almost This means unrivaled amounts of natural
every country in the world. Today, in the resources are being depleted to produce con-
twenty-first century, concrete has become crete. Of equal concern is that the production
the dominant material used in construction of portland cement releases enormous quan-
in Asia (primarily China and India) and has tities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
become, by far, the most widely used build- Additionally, one billion cubic meters of water
ing material in the world.1 According to the are used each year to produce concrete,
United Nations Environment Program, in 2012 demanding an urgent call for concrete design
alone the world used enough concrete to and production to become more ecologically
Cement

116
Millard House by Frank Lloyd Wright
responsive in the twenty-first century, as ubiquitous material used in architecture and
the planet cannot continue to consume con- construction today. 5
crete at the current rate. Concrete is so prevalent that most of
Advanced concrete was initially devel- us can look out the window of the building
oped through trial and error and not purely we are in right now and see something made
scientific knowledge, and this continues of concrete. Simple prefabricated concrete
to be a unique characteristic of concrete. pavers or modest concrete-block buildings
It is an ever-evolving material, and endless abound in most towns and cities. In contrast,
testing occurs in buckets on job sites as well in Japan, one can find examples of the most
as in sophisticated laboratories. Unlike with polished concrete buildings, such as Tadao
steel and glass, anyone can experiment with Ando’s Church of the Light in Osaka. In Chan-
concrete to create original results. digarh, India, Le Corbusier’s béton brut, the
There are countless recipes for custom- rough, unfinished exposed concrete surface
izing concrete. A standard formula is never a that reveals all the marks of the formwork, can
given; it is always made from scratch—home- be found. The American architect Frank Lloyd
made. Ingredients can be mixed, poured, Wright pushed the boundaries of the concrete
vibrated, and cured to launch a chemical re- block in the design of four houses in the Los

Cement
action that turns liquid into solid—rather like Angeles area, where he employed the textile
baking. Experienced workers are even known block. Wright’s cast-concrete textile blocks
to taste the admixture to identify its stage were roughly textured and elegantly patterned
of development. Aggregates can be used to with crosses and squares. Made of concrete
change the weight and visual properties of mixed with soil from the site, the blocks have
cement, and recycled sawdust, metal shav- an earthiness that allowed them to blend in
ings, glass microspheres, and Carrera marble with the immediate landscape. Entire cities,
dust can all be combined with cement, creat- such as Brasília, the capital of Brazil, are made
ing entirely new mixtures with novel traits. of concrete. The massive Three Gorges Dam in
In many parts of the world, making con- China used twenty-one million cubic yards of
crete is integrated into domestic life.4 In concrete and is the largest concrete construc-
São Paulo, Brazil, a women’s collective makes tion in the world. Elsewhere, fiber-reinforced
precast concrete building components ultra-high-performance concrete is being
during the weekdays, which are assembled used to make very thin, delicate, latticelike
during the weekends, when more people rain screens and slender bridges that have
are available. The ease with which one can strengths exceeding that of structures made
make concrete, the many purposes it can with traditional concrete. Concrete’s applica-
serve, and the incredible strength of the tions in the built environment are as many and
final product are what have made it the most varied as the recipes for making concrete. 117
 3D Printing with
Cement
Traditional concrete can be poured contin- technique developed and patented by Behrokh
uously on-site, precast off-site, sprayed, or Khoshnevis at the University of Southern
tilted up. All concrete, however, requires California in 1996, initially began as a novel
formwork, the making of which is a laborious ceramic extrusion and shaping method, de-
skilled construction process. Formwork can signed as an alternative to the emerging poly-
3D Printing with

vary dramatically, from lumber and plywood mer and metal 3D-printing market. In 2000
fastened together using hand tools to large, Khoshnevis and his team began to focus on
prefabricated structures that require heavy construction-scale 3D printing of cementitious
machinery to set into place. There is a redun- pastes. Contour Crafting works by quickly cre-
dancy that is fundamental to concrete con- ating cement outlines in the shape of a room,
Cement

struction: a wooden building is constructed, then building in a layer-by-layer fashion that

into which concrete is poured, and afterward gradually increases in height to form walls.
it is dismantled—and this comes at an envi- At the same time that 3D-printed concrete
ronmental and economic price. In the United and cement have been developed by engi-
States, formwork costs up to 60 percent of neers and scientists in laboratories at major
the total cost of construction, and often it is research universities, students and home
discarded after use.6 However, in the case enthusiasts also have been hacking robots
of 3D-printed concrete, there is no formwork, and 3D printers to develop new recipes for 3D
which means that its potential advantages printing concrete. Andrey Rudenko, a con-
include lower labor costs, increased complex- tractor, used open-source software to build a
ity without specialized labor, greater accu- concrete 3D printer in his garage and printed
racy, less waste, and less use of water. All a small backyard castle for his children.
add up to make 3D-printed concrete poten- Students at the Bartlett in London developed
tially more sustainable and accessible to a a fabrication method that combines the
wide array of concrete gourmands. two already existing concrete 3D-printing
A variety of methods are currently used to methods: extrusion printing and powder print-
3D print concrete at the construction scale. ing. A robotic arm extrudes a linear path of
These include both extrusion and jet-binding concrete, which is then supported by granular
118 techniques. Contour Crafting, an extrusion material until the concrete cures.
3D-printed castle by Andrey Rudenko

Cement
Powder-based 3D printing of portland and lighter than typical concrete. Typical

3D Printing with
cement polymer was developed and patented concrete cures to 3,000 pounds per square
by Ronald Rael, of Emerging Objects, at inch (psi), but powder-based cement poly-
the University of California. In powder-based mer cures to 4,700 psi in compression when
printing, all binding particles used in the mixed with fiber reinforcement. Cement 3D
concrete mix must fit through a 35-picoliter printing generates zero waste, and each
print head, and all cement, aggregate, 3D-printed cement part can be customized
and reinforcement must be smaller than without the need for expensive, unique, or
one-hundredth of an inch. These dimensions disposable formwork.
seem extremely small, but the end result is Bloom is an experimental pavilion that
that the plastic nature of both concrete and employs 3D-printed portland cement at
3D printing offers up a powerful material an architectural scale. It is a nine-foot-tall
solution to recent generative design pro- freestanding tempietto with a footprint that
cesses in architecture, which often feature measures about twelve by twelve feet and
organic, doubly curved surfaces; complex is composed of 840 customized 3D-printed
ornamentation and detail; structural thinness; cement blocks. The floral motif embedded
and translucency. Materials are stronger in the surface of Bloom is derived from 119
 Bloom with Wurster Hall (a concrete building of
the Brutalist era) on the UC Berkeley campus
3D Printing with
Cement

120
 Bloom assembly

traditional Thai flower patterns and is mapped

cylindrically onto the surface of the struc-
ture. Openings in the surface create a figural
pattern that produces stunning visual effects
of light, shade, and shadow on the exterior
and interior. The exterior pattern is most strik-
ing from a distance or when viewed through
the screen of a digital camera. On the interior
is an internal structural grid that carries the
forces of the weight of the cement blocks to
the ground.
The individual blocks were printed on a
print farm of eleven powder 3D printers, with a
special cement composite formulation com-
posed of iron oxide–free portland cement. Iron
oxide imparts a gray color to cement, and its
removal makes these 3D-printed blocks much

Cement
lighter in color.
The blocks are numbered to designate their
position in the overall structure and stacked to

3D Printing with
make sixteen large, lightweight prefabricated
panels, which can be assembled in just a few
hours. Cement that is 3D printed requires no
formwork and produces no waste; the support
material can be reused to produce more blocks.
Coupled with the portland cement is an eco-
logically derived UV-resistant polymer that
uses plant-based materials that do not com-
pete with food sources or displace food-based
agriculture. Producing this material reduces
greenhouse gas emissions 50 percent com-
pared with conventional petroleum-based
epoxies. Each 3D-printed block is coated in the
UV-resistant polymer for additional strength.
The curvilinear form of Bloom’s overall
structures provides added stiffness to the 121
 thin, lightweight shell. The early phases of
its development were inspired by the thin
masonry structures of the Uruguayan archi-
tect and engineer Eladio Dieste (particularly
Iglesia del Cristo Obrero), Thomas Jefferson’s
serpentine brick walls at the University of
Virginia, and the Torqued Ellipse, by Richard
Serra. In plan, Bloom is a curved cruciform
that rises nine feet to meet the same
3D Printing with
Cement

122
123
3D Printing with Cement
 124
3D Printing with Cement
 Cement
shape rotated forty-five degrees, creating 3D-printed structures that have strengths

3D Printing with
a torqued X with an entrance forty-five comparable to more traditional concrete
degrees off its primary axis. The undulating constructions. As we move into the future of
form and spaces recall an elephant’s foot cement-based building, this material proves
or, when coupled with the flower pattern on yet again its suitability for being continu-
the surface, the traditional mud houses ously reengineered—endlessly tested and
found in the Tiébélé village in Ghana—a retested to achieve multiple levels of perfor-
reference to the earliest inspirations for 3D mance. Thousands of years of evolution
printing by Emerging Objects. have demonstrated its robust characteristics,
Bloom is an excellent example of how and it will continue to evolve as techniques
portland cement combined with very little in additive manufacturing become more com-
water can be used to create intricate monplace in building and construction.

125
 Cement The SCIN Cube is a cellular solid—a
transmaterial grouping characterized by

Objects high strength-to-weight ratios—made from

3D-printed cement polymer. The cube is
composed of a network of digital cellular
bodies that are first relaxed to produce a
more uniform field and then structurally
differentiated in relation to their distance
to the outside surface. The inner core’s cell
edges are extremely thin and fragile; they
are protected by multiple layers of increas-
ingly more robust edges closer to the
cube’s outside boundary.
Cement
Objects

126
Starlight is made up of thirty-two parts surface. The thinness of the print allows for
assembled from 3D-printed iron oxide–free material translucency, and the cement has a
portland cement with a patina-inducing agent soft glow. Components are held together with
that creates an uneven, aged finish on the nylon hardware.

Objects
Cement

127
 128
Cement Objects
These Grab Tiles are designed with deep
undercuts and doubly curved surfaces, which
would make them difficult, if not impossible,
to cast using conventional methods. The loop-
ing and curving relief pattern on top of the
tiles provides various ways to interact with
them. Users in elder-care facilities, for exam-
ple, who may need assistance in getting up or
in preventing falls, can insert their fingers
and hands in the tiles to use them as handles.

Objects
Cement

129
Cement

The designs for the Rocker Vases are some

Objects

of the first objects made by Emerging Objects

for 3D printing with cement. The vases test
thinness, excavation techniques, detail, reso-
lution, and the cantilevering strength of
unsupported and unpolymerized material.
The Rocker Vases are intended to be
balanced when empty. When plants or water
are inserted into the vases, they tip one direc-
tion or another, depending on the weight and
distribution of the flower display.

130
The Seat Slug is a biomorphic interpretation
of a bench. Its form is inspired by Flabellina
goddardi, the most recent species of sea
slugs discovered off the coast of California,
and by the infinite tessellations of Japanese
karakusa patterns. The Seat Slug blurs the
lines between biology, technology, and furni-
ture design and is an exploration of function
and form. It is constructed of 230 unique
3D-printed cement blocks that are coated
with organic resins to create a reflective,
finished surface.

Objects
Cement

131
 132
Cement Objects
 Objects
Cement
Drum is a study in large-scale, lightweight 3D
printing, using dark-gray expansion cement.
A simple flange-based connection system
holds the thin cement panels in compression;
the overall spiral form cantilevers from a
central fulcrum point. Each panel is held in
compression using binder clips, allowing for
quick assembly and disassembly. The cement
prints are sandblasted to bring out the grain
of each panel produced by the additive man-
ufacturing process. 133
 134
Cement Objects
The Seed (P_Ball) is 3D printed in gray
cement polymer and sandblasted to appear
matte and soft. Seed (P_Ball) is the latest
object in Andrew Kudless’s P_series, projects
that explore digital and physical processes
of self-organization. In this prototype, a
geodesic sphere is digitally inflated yet con-
strained by multiple points. This tension
creates a series of undulating surfaces across
the larger geodesic framework. The 3D-
printed prototype was created to help under-
stand the visual, geometric, and fabrication
issues involved in producing a larger cast-
concrete installation for the University
of California Botanical Garden at Berkeley.

Objects
Twenty 3D-printed cement hexagons and
twelve pentagons converge to form the

Cement
sphere.

135
 The Planter Tiles are 3D-printed cement tiles. The tiles are printed with varying
hexagonal tiles that close pack. The overall admixtures of aggregate combined with
pattern combines six different tile types, portland cement to produce varying
four of which can hold plants. The three- shades and tints; using these different
dimensional petal motif visually ties formulations creates a rich and textured
together all the planter and nonplanter surface effect.
Cement
Objects

136
137
Cement Objects
Clay
Some of the oldest objects crafted by cities, constructed some ten thousand years
human­kind are made of clay; the human body ago, were built from unfired mud bricks.
is often the subject of these early cultural Scientists theorize that this humble materi-
artifacts. The Venus of Dolní Věstonice al also composes the fundamental building
is a twenty-six-thousand-year-old ceramic blocks of life itself. One particular type
figurine from the Paleolithic era discovered of clay, montmorillonite, is considered the
in the Moravian basin south of Brno, the material segue between matter that is not
Czech Republic. This literal clay body was alive and life, which began as a muddy stew
fabricated using local terra-cotta mixed with of clay and water transformed into living
powdered mammoth bone. (The introduc- matter by electrical charges from lightning,
tion of bone ash from cattle bones was an forming the first microscopic structures that
innovation also used tens of thousands of one finds in living cells. 2
years later, in the invention of bone china in Clay is a combination of alumina, silica,
late eighteenth-century Britain.) Not only and chemically bonded water. Particles of
does the Venus from the Dolní Věstonice clay are extremely small, 0.7 microns in diam-
site represent the earliest known ceramic eter and 0.005 microns thick, and they are
technology, she also represents one of the usually easily found in riverbeds and deltas.
earliest known depictions of the female body Clay particles are flat, two-dimensional, and

Clay
and the earliest known use of animal bodies electrically charged. They touch on only
in the making of ceramic objects.1 two sides; when flooded with water, a strong
Clay is the basic building block of con- attraction occurs, which is what makes clay
temporary civilization. The oldest permanent particles bond to each other. The water also

139
Matauri clay pit in New Zealand
 lubricates the particles, which is what allows to an estimated five thousand people in the
them to slide and makes the clay plastic Indus Valley civilization.
and malleable. The oldest existing earthen buildings
Clay can be found in almost all parts of are in the abandoned city of Shahr-e Sukhteh
the world. It’s cheap, if not free. Its colors in present-day Iran, built around 3200 BCE.
range from white to red to black, with every Eventually, people started to build clay
shade and tint in between, and when fired, furniture in the form of benches and beds
clay turns back into a stonelike material that next to a clay oven or fire pit. An early form
lasts indefinitely. Most clay is fired at around of Egyptian pyramid constructed of mud
2,000 to 2,300 degrees Fahrenheit (1,090 brick is called the mastaba, which means
to 1,260 degrees Celsius), which is a similar “mud bench.” For thousands of years, in
temperature to most magmas. The kiln’s villages and cities all over the world, people
heat reenacts the geologic processes that lived in buildings made of clay—buildings
create stone. that surrounded hearths made of clay, where
While the first clay objects made by pots and vessels made of clay could be found
humans were figurines, the next were pottery for cooking and storage, creating entire
vessels. These vessels were baked in out- domestic environments made of clay.
door bonfires to be watertight and rock hard. In northern Europe, clay pots were insert-
Clay

Anthropologists speculate that women would ed into the walls of clay ovens. These pots
put a fine layer of mud in their woven baskets sometimes faced in and filled up with the hot
to make them impermeable, so they could air inside the oven, to quickly transmit heat
hold water or fat, as some of the earliest into the room’s interior, and sometimes faced
remnants of clay pottery show impressions of out and were known as “fist warmers.” If
woven baskets. Subsequently, women began your hands were cold and stiff from working
using the coiling technique to make pots by outdoors you could insert them into the
hand for storing water, grains, and cooking pots to warm them.4
fat. Evidence of the first clay pots appears Earth constructions composed of mud
in Japan around 10,000 BCE in the agrarian brick, rammed earth, cob, and wattle and
culture of the Jamon.3 Simultaneously, around daub continue to be built all over the world.
10,000 BCE, the first houses were being made The largest existing mud-brick structure in
of mud bricks in the Mehrgarh region of what the world is the Mosque of Djenné in Mali.
is today Pakistan. Mud bricks were made It was built in 1907 and continues to be the
of loam, mud, sand, and water mixed with a center of religious and cultural life in Mali.
binding material such as rice husks or straw. Traditional buildings are not the only
These houses coalesced into communities earthen architecture that exists. The Center
140 and cities made of mud brick that housed up for the Blind in Mexico City, a contemporary
Tepetate Wall at the Center for the Blind and Visually
Impaired by Taller de Arquitectura-Mauricio Rocha

Clay
work by Taller de Arquitectura-Mauricio Roman Empire. The bricks were stamped with
Rocha, is made of concrete, glass, and natu- the mark of the legion that supervised their
rally compacted clay, called tepetate, which production. They differed from other ancient
is cut out of the ground. The Eden Project bricks in size and shape—they were round,
visitor’s center in Cornwall, England, by square, oblong, triangular, or rectangular and
Grimshaw Architects is constructed of high- were generally one or two Roman feet long
quality china clay taken directly from the by one Roman foot wide. The Romans favored
site and rammed into walls. Unfired clay is this type of brickmaking during the first cen-
one of humankind’s oldest building materials, tury of their civilization and used the bricks
and it continues to be a viable and sustain- for buildings all over the empire, including
able method of construction worldwide. at the baths of Caracalla and the Pantheon.
Fired brick was first used in the Indus During the industrial era of 1800s
Valley around 3000 BCE. Ceramic brick England, the production of bricks became
technology later was adopted, commercial- mechanized. Bricks could be extruded,
ized, and disseminated by the Romans. pressed, or molded by machines with incred-
Using mobile kilns, the Romans successful- ible speed, resulting in the construction of
ly introduced kiln-fired bricks to the entire entire cities made of brick all over the world. 141
 3D Printing with
Clay
Since the advent of additive manufacturing, Because jet binding creates porous objects,
clay can be used to make sculptural objects the inherent output of the printer inspired
and figures, pots and vessels, bricks, blocks, the design of the Cool Brick.
tiles, and entire earthen buildings. The There are many technologies for keeping
World’s Advanced Saving Project (WASP) interiors comfortable in hot, arid climates.
uses clay extruders to 3D print large struc- Evaporative cooling is one such technology;
3D Printing with

tures such as columns and walls up to it has been used for thousands of years and
twelve feet high, using their BigDeltaWASP is still in use today. Called the Muscatese
printer. Their goal is to build a prototype evaporative cooling window, the system
for a sustainable village composed of 3D- employs a porous ceramic vessel filled with
printed mud houses. The mud is sourced water, which is placed in a window. As cool
Clay

locally; little infrastructure and no industrial breezes blow over the jug, the water evap-
or expensive materials are required to make orates and humidifies the air, lowering the
the building shell, since the mud is mixed temperature of the room. This is combined
with straw to strengthen it. Like traditional with a wood screen, called a mashrabiya,
mud brick buildings or puddled mud build- which keeps the vessel and the room in
ings, the clay buildings 3D printed by WASP shade, ensuring that both stay cool. The en-
will be baked solely by the sun. tire ingenious system requires no electricity
Emerging Objects has developed formu- or ozone-depleting refrigerants.
las and techniques for 3D printing clay, both Inspired by the Muscatese, the Cool
with powder-based printers and with paste- Brick masonry system collapses the ceramic
extrusion printers that use moistened clay. vessel, wood screen, and window into a
The Cool Brick takes advantage of powder- single building component made possible by
based jet-binding printing technology. 3D printing.

142
Individual Cool Brick

Clay
3D Printing with
Sun shade
Hot air escaping from
high claustre work
opening

Shutters control
air movement

Evaporative cooling
as breeze passes
over surface of porous Porous water pot
water pot

143
Muscatese window
 Cool Brick assembly
with mortar
3D Printing with
Clay

144
 The Cool Brick comprises two scales of
porosity. The first is a microporosity that
absorbs water through capillary action and
stores it in the brick itself. The second is
a matrix of openings, in a three-dimensional
lattice that allows air to pass through the
wall. As air moves through the 3D-printed
brick, the water held in the micropores of the
ceramic evaporates, bringing cool, humidified
air into the interior environment, lowering
the temperature using the same principle of
evaporative cooling as the Muscatese.
The bricks are modular and interlocking
and can be stacked together to make a
screen. The three-dimensional lattice creates
a strong bond when set in mortar; surface
relief creates shade in order to keep a large
percentage of the wall’s surface cool and

Clay
protected from the sun, thus improving its
performance.

3D Printing with

145
 In addition to powder-based printing, define the printed object. We have gener-
paste-extrusion 3D printing has allowed ated a series of controlled errors that create
Emerging Objects to explore radical new expressions in clay defined by the
3D-printing techniques, resulting in the plasticity of the material, gravity, and ma-
development of a series of objects titled chine behavior.
GCODE.clay. One outcome of this experiment was
The GCODE.clay objects are fabricated the creation of textured surfaces that are
using various clay bodies (b-mix with grog, reminiscent of textile knitting patterns. Typ-
paper clay, porcelain, basaltic clay with ically, extrusion-based 3D-printed ceramic
manganese, recycled clay, and local clays) objects are defined by the striations of the
to explore the creative potential of designing clay layers on the object’s surface, but in this
with G-code. The exploration concerns case, the surface takes on the appearance
itself less with the object’s shape or profile of a knitted textile, with clay being looped,
3D Printing with

than with the path that defines the move- purled, and knotted as it droops away from
ment of the 3D printer. Through this explo- the surface. Occasionally a “dropped stitch”
ration, the 3D printer is pushed beyond causes a loop to pull away from the surface,
the boundaries of what would typically making every print unique.
Clay

Visualization
of G-code

146
GCODE.Clay collection

Clay
3D Printing with

147
 In addition to permitting patterning con-
trolled by G-code, paste extrusion offers the
possibility of combining clay bodies. During
the third debate of the 2016 US presiden-
tial election, then candidate Donald Trump
said that he wanted to build a wall between
the United States and Mexico to keep out
the “bad hombres.” He was referring to bad
men, but what he said sounded more like
“bad ombrés”—which connotes something
very different. Ombré, which translates
from the French as “shade,” refers to that
which progresses from light to dark. An
3D Printing with

ombré allows for unbroken transitions across

borders and between landscapes; it crosses
political boundaries fluidly and allows for
continuous cultural connections.
In response to Trump’s “bad hombres”
Clay

statement, Emerging Objects created a

collection of 3D-printed vessels called
Bad Ombrés, which smoothly transition from
one material to another. The clay bodies
used in the Bad Ombrés collection come
from different regions around the world and
are combined in a single tube that extrudes
clay continuously.
The colors and tones of the Bad Ombré
vessels blend into one another: one clay body
graduates into another, from light to dark
and from translucent to opaque. Black Moun-
tain and Cassius Basaltic clay, some of the
most opaque and black clays available, tran-
sition to Polar Ice porcelain, which is mined
at the Matauri Bay clay pit in New Zealand
and is the world’s whitest clay. This unique
148 clay is delicate, resonant, and translucent
Bad Ombrés in white porcelain
and black mountain clay
149
3D Printing with Clay
 when struck with light. It is derived from the
geologic transformation of volcanic rocks,
and the clay body includes alumina-silicates
and plasticizers to make it more workable.
The Black Mountain clay bodies are a com-
bination of fireclays, ball clays, and red clays
that come from pits deep in the southern
part of the United States. These clays are
blended in California to create a strong clay
body that is easily workable.
The Bad Ombrés are objects that tran-
scend borders. They are simultaneously root-
ed in the ground from which they emerge, yet
3D Printing with

they are global and inclusive. No ombré in

this collection will ever be re-created exactly
the same way again: randomness, individual-
ity, distinct character, and unique markings
are all what make these pieces special.
Clay

Their differences make them one of a kind,

but the ombré itself ties them together.

150
Bad Ombrés collection
151
3D Printing with Clay
 Clay The Planter Bricks are custom-designed

Objects masonry units that counter the heat

island effect in big cities through evapo-
transpiration and pollution conversion. The
plants in the wall help mediate the tem-
perature of the microclimate surrounding
the building, buffer sound, and filter the air;
the whiteness of the clay reflects light and
heat. The fine particles of the 3D-printed
clay bricks are held together with an organic
binder, and the bricks are fired, burning
off the organic materials and leaving behind
a strong ceramic object. The Planter Bricks
come in standard dimensions and can fit
within existing masonry wall systems. They
can be glazed in any color.
Clay
Objects

152
FLO is a 3D-printed ceramic vessel composed
of spheroids that flow into one another,
creating a blobby, fluid surface with irregular
openings. The spheres appear to be mole-
cules that collide with one another and stick
together as they push and pull in a liquid
motion, creating an overall form that is con-
tinuous and smooth.

Objects
Clay

153
Clay
Objects

154
Clay is excavated from a local site and dried . . . pulverized . . . screened to filter out debris and rocks . . .
 “Is it possible to 3D print directly from the
ground beneath one’s feet?” was the question
explored in the development of Wursterware.
The bottom floor of Wurster Hall, on the Uni-
versity of California, Berkeley, campus, was
undergoing renovation, and an excavation
exposed the clay-rich soil atop of which the
College of Environmental Design building was
constructed. To take advantage of this op-
portunity, several large buckets of this local
clay were gathered, sifted, and reconstituted
to create functional earthenware vessels.

Objects
Clay
Wursterware Vessels printed
using local clay

155
rehydrated . . . and is ready for use in a 3D printer to create earthenware objects.
 Berkeley-Rupp Architecture Prize in
3D-printed ceramic, glazed white
Clay
Objects

156
 Unwrapping the prize

Emerging Objects was honored to have the

opportunity to design the physical repre-
sentation of the Berkeley-Rupp Architecture
Prize, which awards $100,000 biannually
to a distinguished practitioner or academic
who has made a significant contribution to
promoting gender equality in the field of
architecture and whose work emphasizes a
commitment to sustainability and community.
The first medal recorded in history was
given by Alexander the Great to recognize
military service. Medals were originally in-
tended to be used as jewelry; they were also
used as a form of propaganda, often given to
politicians to show their support for a partic-

Objects
ular lobby. Today, all architectural medals are
made of precious metals, and their designs
still reflect the earliest military medals.

Clay
In contrast to a medal, the physical repre-
sentation of the Berkeley-Rupp Architecture
Prize is crafted from the humblest of materi-
als—clay—and is spatial and nonhierarchical.
The design is a three-dimensional object fab-
ricated under the new paradigm of additive
manufacturing to represent an updated view
of the role of architects in today’s society.
The first documented trophy was made
of clay—a ceramic amphora filled with oil
that was given to the winners of the Olympic
Games. The Berkeley-Rupp Architecture
Prize comes in a contemporary amphora, dig-
itally crafted using materials and processes
developed by Emerging Objects.

Digital model
of the prize 157
Clay+
The 3D-Printed Cabin brings many of our mate-
rial, software, and hardware experiments together
to demonstrate the architectural potential of
additive manufacturing on a weathertight, struc-
turally sound building.
The front facade has been described as a box
of exquisite chocolates—composed of a number
of Planter Tile shapes and materials to create
a living wall of succulents that naturally thrive in
the Northern California climate. Several different
materials are used, including shades of portland
cement, sawdust, chardonnay, and combinations
thereof.  
The roof and contiguous facades to the gable
are clad in 3D-printed ceramic tiles that serve
as a rain screen. Designed for easy assembly,
these Seed Stitch tiles are made to be hung on
a building facade or interior. The surface of each

Clay+
ceramic tile visually emulates a knitting tech-
nique called the seed stitch. G-code is used to
control each line of clay as it is 3D printed to cre-
ate a loopy texture that looks like seeds scattered
across the surface. While all ceramic tiles are
printed from the same file, each tile is intention-
ally unique as a product of fabrication, during
which the tiles wave back and forth, causing the
printer to pull at the line of clay and creating
longer and shorter loops toward the end of each
tile, producing a distinct machine-made texture
that is different every time.
The interior is clad with the Chroma Curl Wall,
which illuminates not only the interior of the cab-
in but also its exterior, converting the cabin into
a beacon of light in ways that are abstract and
artificial, in concert with the unnatural materials
that clad this humble but spectacular retreat.  159
Recipes
Many companies and schools around the to use other water-based materials in their
world own powder-based binder-jet 3D print- place. The powders are also easy to substi-
ers (often of the unsupported Z Corpora- tute, as long as they are very finely pulver-
tion brand). These printers are quite simple ized and have some water solubility.
devices; they employ an additive manufac- The ingredients used for concocting the
turing process that deposits a binder mate- objects throughout this book vary. Differ-
rial onto a thin layer of powder. The liquid ent formulations were generated specifically
binder is sprayed from an off-the-shelf ink- for each material and refined for their per-
jet printhead (hence “3D printing”). These formance, flowability, adhesion, precision,
printheads are the same as those used in and strength. Developing the constituents
2D printers, but when 3D printing, the black for each recipe has been a lengthy process
ink is purged from the printhead and re- involving much trial and error. Nevertheless,
placed with a water-based liquid binder that anyone can create powder materials for
fuses the powder particles together. 3D printing.
The proprietary materials (powders and Here are a few quick recipes to jump-start
liquid binders) associated with these printers the process of making open-source liquid
can be very expensive. But because the liquid binder and powder mixtures for binder-jet
binders consist mostly of water, it’s easy additive manufacturing.1

These recipes have been successful

for the authors of this book and are true
and complete to the best of our knowl-
edge. All the recipes are made without
guarantee on the part of the authors or
publishers of this book. The author and
publisher disclaim any liability in connec-
tion to the use of these recipes.
 Liquid
Binders
Rice Wine Binder Alcohol and Water Binder
If you aren’t in the mood for cooking, the A simple recipe for binder requires only two
easiest binder to use is sake rice wine right ingredients.
out of the bottle. Inexpensive, unflavored,
Ingredients
and uncolored is best. You may try a few
Drugstore brand 91% isopropyl alcohol (280 ml)
brands, but make sure that there are no
Distilled water (920 ml)
particles in the liquid and that it is distilled,
clean, and clear (15–20% alcohol). You can Method
open the sake and pour it right into the 1 Mix alcohol and water in a container.
binder bottle before you purge the print- 2 Shake or stir as preferred.
head. Then run the purge cycle to remove 3 Pour into the binder bottle and serve.

Recipes
the black ink from the cartridge, and it’ll
be replaced with the rice wine. You may
get an overheat error, but simply rerun the
purge cycle. Once you begin printing,
you’ll notice a beautiful aroma of rice wine
filling the air.

161
 Powders
Terra-cotta slip
This is a recipe for 3D printing ceramics
that can be fired in a kiln. Inhaling terra-cotta is dangerous.
Wear a dust mask and use proper
Ingredients
ventilation.
Terra-cotta powder (4 parts by weight)
Powdered sugar (1 part by weight)
Maltodextrin (1 part by weight)

Method
1 Mix the terra-cotta, powdered sugar, 4 Experiment with spraying different binder
and maltodextrin together in a large saturation levels and material layer
Recipes

bucket. This can be done by placing the thicknesses. Settings vary from printer to
lid on the bucket and shaking vigorously printer and in different climates depend-
or, in a well-ventilated area, mixing with ing on ambient humidity.
a drill mixer. 6 Use established settings to print final
2 Carefully fill the supply bed of the 3D object.
printer with the terra-cotta mixture. 7 Wait 24 hours to excavate and depowder
3 Purge the black ink from the printhead the final object.
and fill the supply reservoir with rice wine 8 Bisque-fire the air-dried porcelain part for
instead of the proprietary binder. strengthening.
9 Glaze to taste.
10 Fire to full temperature recommended by
clay supplier. Enjoy!

162
Sugar-Sugar Powder Salt Powder
If your sweet tooth beckons, here’s a recipe If you aren’t in the mood for sweets,
for 3D printing sugar. It can be printed here’s something savory: a recipe for 3D
with either binder, and the results are just printing salt.
as sweet. There are only two ingredients
Ingredients
in this recipe: sugar and sugar.
Finely powdered salt (8 parts by weight)
Ingredients Maltodextrin (1 part by weight)
Granulated sugar (2 parts by weight)
Method
Powdered sugar, 10x or 12x (1 part by weight)
1 Mix the finely ground salt with the
Method maltodextrin, either by shaking in a large,
1 Mix the granulated sugar and the pow- closed bucket until evenly distributed or
dered sugar together in a large container. by combining with a drill mixer. Remem-
2 Fill the supply bed of the 3D printer with ber to do so only in a well-ventilated area
the sugar mixture. and to protect yourself by wearing a dust
3 Purge the black ink from the printhead mask or respirator.
and fill the binder bottle with rice wine. 2 Purge the black ink from the printhead
Experiment with spraying different binder and fill the binder bottle with rice wine.

Recipes
saturation levels and material layer thick- 3 Experiment with spraying different binder
nesses. Settings vary from printer to saturation levels and material layer thick-
printer and location, depending on ambi- nesses. Remember, settings can vary from
ent humidity. A good technique for testing printer to printer and in different climates
is to make 5 × 5 × 150 mm test bars. Print depending on ambient humidity.
them and see if the previous layer appears 4 Use established settings to print final
through the current printing layer. If so, object.
it means the two layers are receiving 5 Wait 24 hours to excavate and depowder
enough binder and are fusing together. the final object.
4 Use established settings to print final 6 Postprocess with cyanoacrylate, polymer,
object. or wax for strengthening or leave natural.
5 Wait twenty-four hours (a good starting
point, but timing really depends on the Note: If finely powdered salt is not available,
humidity in the air) to excavate and grind table salt or even coarse road salt
depowder final object. Use the machine’s in a coffee grinder and sift through 60, 100,
recommended setting and techniques 120, and 150 mesh screens until it looks
for excavating. like white dust.
6 Postprocess with cyanoacrylate, polymer,
or wax for strengthening (or don’t). 163
 DIY
Recipes
There are several steps involved in inventing
other materials for powder-based 3D printing.
Below is a guide to the steps we undergo
when inventing a new material.

Bench testing
Bench testing is used to verify the correctness
or soundness of the material formulation.

1 Mix small batches of different ingredients

Recipes

in parts in a small cup, for example, two

parts sugar to one part powdered sugar.
2 Pour the batches out on a flat surface
in small piles and flatten each pile with a
spatula or rolling pin.
3 Spray liquid binder on the top surface
of the flattened piles, using a small spray
bottle, then leave the mixture to rest for
24 hours.
4 Examine the top layer of the mixture
that was sprayed with binder. If it is stiff,
hard, solid, and distinct in strength from
the loose powder below, you are on the
right track to inventing a material. If it
crumbles, then it’s too weak and the ingre-
dient ratios need to be adjusted (add
more sticky stuff).

164
Test Bars
Test bars are small 3D prints that allow
you to examine the strength and dimensional
accuracy of the material and to adjust the
binder settings. When bench testing has re-
sulted in a formula that shows promise, move
to the 3D printer to print test bars using
your new recipe.

1 Fill the supply bed in a powder-based 4 Remove the printed bars by raising the
printer with 3 inches of the material build bed in the printer and brushing off

Recipes
formulation. the loose powder surrounding the bars.
2 Make test bars that are 5 × 5 × 150 mm If the bars are solid to the touch and are
and orient them horizontally (in the not warped or crumbly, then the print
xy-plane) in the printer software. has been successful. If the bar crumbles,
3 Test different layer thicknesses and sat- then repeat the process, adjusting the
uration level settings using the ZPrinter software for greater saturation levels. If
software (or other software if you’re not the bar is warped, repeat the process
using a Z Corporation powder printer). with lower saturation levels.
If the saturation levels are too high, the 5 Dip or brush the bar with wax, polymer, or
powder within the printed portion of the cyanoacrylate to process, or enjoy raw!
bar will smear outside the bar boundaries.

165
 Developing one’s own materials for 3D The objects below are printed in curry and
printing opens the door to new material cement (left) and sugar (right)—two custom-
possibilities and combinations. Some of the ized recipes using off-the-shelf materials
advantages include reduced cost, the ability that demonstrate the ease of creating multi-
to develop new color variations and tex- sensorial objects. The aromas of the materials
tures, and the potential for using local and as they are being printed are pervasive
recycled materials. and evocative.
The objects, building components, This process also raises important
spaces, and structures that are formed questions about the historical and contextual
through 3D printing can engage the visual, meaning of objects, as well as very simple
haptic, and olfactory senses, as well as ones, like why curry and concrete? Asking
possess extraordinary geometric complexity. such questions of objects leads to creativity
Recipes

Curry Pot, 3D printed

166 in curry and cement
and speculation about the possibilities of material behavior, analysis, and manufac-
contemporary craft. As pointed out by turing suggest that 3D printing, especially
the British design scholar Gareth Williams, when coupled with modes of production that
“To retain relevance in the modern world, use materials from sustainable resources
craft must engage with contemporary con- and waste streams, is a contemporary form
cerns. One of the most pressing issues today of craft with increasing relevance. And if
is the impact of production, consumption we draw from the craft traditions of the past
and disposal of goods upon the earth’s re- when speculating about the future, the
sources and ecological balance.”2 The objects emerging objects from this nascent technol-
produced by 3D printing are not strictly ogy can inform, shape, and imbue meaning
handmade objects; however, the close con- in future forms of architecture, as well as
nections among design, iteration, technique, have lasting value for contemporary culture.

Recipes

Cotton Candy Jar 167

 Acknowledgments
The work produced in this volume could has advised on everything from clay bodies,
not have been possible without the talent, firing temperatures, and glazes to the intel-
support, and effort of an enormous and lectual and philosophical implications of
diverse group of people, institutions, and craft, sculpture, design, and life. Many other
sponsors. The genesis of this research was colleagues at UC Berkeley are to be thanked
in 2009, with the generous guidance of for their support of the work, including
Dr. Mark Ganter at the Solheim Additive Greg Niemeyer, Stephanie Syjuco, and Erik
Manufacturing Laboratory in the Mechanical Scollon, Department of Art Practice; Professor
Engineering Department at the University Claudia Ostertag, Civil and Environmental
of Washington, who gave us the courage to Engineering; Tom Buresh, chair of the
experiment with printing any material we Department of Architecture; and Jennifer
desired. His knowledge and encouragement Wolch, dean of the College of Environmental
early on was instrumental in our ability to Design. Early research in 3D-printed ceramics
improve on and develop the new materials was conducted in a research seminar at UC
used in this book. Berkeley that helped develop formulas for 3D
Much of the research was performed at printing porcelain with students Emily Licht,
the University of California, Berkeley, and Colleen Paz, Plamena Milusheva, and Brian
we are indebted to our colleagues there, Grieb—their efforts laid the groundwork for
including Nicholas de Monchaux, who first further experimentation. Several colleagues at
made us aware of Dr. Ganter’s research, and San Jose State University are to be thanked
Professor Emeritus Richard Shaw, former for their support of this research, including
head of ceramics at UC Berkeley, who was Brian Kimura, former chair of the Department
not only willing to let us in the ceramics of Design; Professor Leslie Speer, Department
department but also helped fund the pur- of Design; Professor Shannon Wright; and
chase of the first printer, which we used to Cassandra Straubing, Department of Art.
test Dr. Ganter’s open-source ceramic formu- Additional thanks goes to the numerous
las. An enormous deal of gratitude goes to students at the University of California and
Ehren Tool, ceramics technician, colleague, San Jose State University who raised critical
168 friend, and collaborator, who since 2009 questions about the relationship between
additive manufacturing and architecture Catherine Lewis, and Annie Shaw at 3D
in seminars and studios, and the many Systems; Karen Linder and Aaron Rager at
people who have assisted and inspired the Tethon3D; Spencer Wright at nTopology;
work in countless ways, including Joshua Tom Rosenmayer at Lehigh Technologies;
Stein, Jeffrey McGrew, Michael Swain, and Danny Defelici at 3D Potter.
Nathan Lynch, Andrew Kudless, Jason Research sponsorship was made possible
Johnson, Nataly Gattegno, Thom Faulders, by generous support from the Hellman
Scott Summit, Jenny Sabin, Bruce Beasley, Family Fund, the Bakar Fellows Program, the
Bill Kreysler, Joris Komen, Reem Makkawi, Environmental Protection Agency, San Jose
Lily Shafroth Forbes, Rob Steiner, Molly State University, the University of California,
Reichert, Natalie Yu, Anthony Giannini, Berkeley, the Siam Research Group, and the
Christine Rael, Margaret San Fratello, Northern Clay Center.
Angelo San Fratello, Behrokh Khoshnevis, The talent, insight, hard work, and
Andrey Rudenko, Yuri Milo, Mark Kelly, Elli dedication of our past and present team at
Koutselos, Igor Siddiqui, Dew Tipwimol, Emerging Objects and the printFARM—
Ellen Lupton, Andrew Jeffery, Andy J. Scott, designers, technicians, research specialists,
Paul Sacaridiz, Michael Eden, Jonathan business partners, and interns, who have
Keep, Gerson and Barbara Bass Bakar, Claire established a legacy of the consideration
Warnier, and Dries Verbruggen at Unfold. of additive manufacturing in architecture
We are indebted to Matthew Millman for beginning in 2009 through the present—
his talents and generosity for photographing continue to inspire and motivate us. They
much our work, often for long hours, on are: Kent Wilson, Emily Licht, Alexander
short notice, and with immediate deadlines. Schofield, Mona Ghandi, Barrak Darweesh,
The support of several companies has Logman Arga, Bryan Allen, Alex Niemeyer,
helped us accomplish this work, and we Ari Oppenhiemer, Chase Lunt, Chris
would like to express our gratitude to DeHenzel, Eleftheria Stavridi, Hannah Cao,
Carl Bass, Duann Scott, Eyal Nir, Andreas John Faichney, Maricela Chan, Nick Buccelli,
Bastian, Vanessa Sigurdson, and Noah Robert Geshlider, Seong Koo Lee, Stephan
Weinstein at Autodesk; Leonard Dodd and Adams, Yonghwan Kim, Sandy Curth, and
Susana Dodd at Erectorbot; Brad Peebler at our biggest inspiration of all, Mattias Rael—
Luxology/ Foundry; Bre Pettis at MakerBot / who at eight years of age offers design
Bold Machines; Robert Steiner at MakerBot / advice, excavates prints, explains 3D
Bold Machines / Roboto.NYC; Tom Pasterik printing to audiences, and reminds us that
at ExOne; Scott Summit, Hugh Evans, the present is as important as the future.

Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello 169

2017
 Project Credits All objects designed by Ronald Rael
and Virginia San Fratello of Emerging
Objects unless noted otherwise

3D-Printed Cabin 158–59 Twisting Tower 31 Coffee, Tea, and Wine sponsorship of Tethon 3D,
Project team: Ronald Rael, Project team: Ronald Rael, Spoons 46 which fabricated these
Virginia San Fratello, Virginia San Fratello, Kent FLO 153 parts.
Logman Arja, Hannah Wilson Wood, chardonnay, Grab Tiles 128–29
Cao, Sandy Curth, Barrak rubber, and salt material Ombré Decanters 60–61 Earthscrapers 99–107
Darweesh, Yonghwan Kim, development: Ronald Rael, Romanescos 84–85 Project team: Ronald Rael,
Daniel Komen, Cooper Virginia San Fratello Saltshakers 28 Virginia San Fratello,
Rodgers, Alex Schofield, Sugar Teaspoons 54 Maricela Chan, Chris
Phirak Suon, Kent Wilson Bloom 119–25 Utah Tea Set 52–53 DeHenzel, John Faichney,
Acknowledgments: Special Project team: Ronald Rael, Project team: Ronald Rael, Emily Licht Sand material
thanks to Danny Defelici Virginia San Fratello, Kent Virginia San Fratello Wood, development: Ronald
at 3D Potter, Eyal Nir at Wilson, Alex Schofield, chardonnay, salt, and tea Rael, Virginia San Fratello
Autodesk, Ehren Tool, and Sofia Anastassiou, material development: Acknowledgments:
the Department of Art Yina Dong, Stephan Ronald Rael, Virginia San Earthscrapers was made
Practice at UC Berkeley Adams, Alex Niemeyer, Fratello possible with a grant
Ari Oppenhiemer, from the 2010 Biennial
Bad Ombrés 1, 138, 148–51 Reem Makkawi, Steven Chroma Curl Wall 88–89 of the Americas and was
Wursterware 154–55 Huang Cement material Project team: Ronald Rael, on display as part of the
Project team: Ronald Rael, development: Ronald Rael Virginia San Fratello, exhibit The Nature of
Virginia San Fratello, Acknowledgements: Hannah Cao, Yongwan Kim Things. Special thanks
Phirak Suon Technical Bloom was made possible to Ehren Tool, Professor
assistance: Ehren Tool, by a partnership with the Coffee Coffee Cups 55 Richard Shaw, Dr. Mark
Nicki Green (Wursterware) printFARM (Print Facility Project team: Ronald Rael, Ganter at the Solheim RP/
Acknowledgments: for Architecture, Research, Virginia San Fratello, RM Lab at the University
Special thanks to Danny and Materials) at the Alexander Schofield, Kent of Washington, Pax at
Defelici at 3D Potter, UC Berkeley College of Wilson Coffee grounds MediumVFX, and Luxology.
Autodesk, Ehren Tool, and Environmental Design and material development:
the Department of Art the Siam Cement Group Ronald Rael, Alexander GCODE.clay 146–47
Practice at UC Berkeley. (SCG Thailand). Additional Schofield Coffee cherry Project team: Ronald Rael,
project support was material development: Virginia San Fratello,
Berkeley-Rupp Archi- made through generous Ronald Rael, Virginia San Phirak Suon, Kent Wilson,
tecture Prize 156–57 sponsorship from 3D Fratello Alexander Schofield
Drum 114, 132–33 Systems and Entropy Acknowledgments: Special
Haeckel Bowls 10, 30–31, Cool Bricks 142–45 thanks to Nathan John,
Resins. Design team: Ronald Rael,
44–45 Clarke Selman, Douglas
Lamprocyclas Burl Bowl 43 Virginia San Fratello Burnham, envelope
Raelsanfratellis 42 Burst Tiles 41 Acknowledgements: A+D, Danny Defelici at
Rocker Vases 130 Chardonnay Wine This project was made 3D Potter, Eyal Nir at
170 Starlight 80, 127 Goblets 58 possible by the generous Autodesk, and especially
to the incomparable Ehren Newsprint material Virginia San Fratello, Seat Slug 131
Tool in the Department development: Ronald Rael, Voung Dao, Kent Wilson Project team: Ronald Rael,
of Art Practice at UC Anthony Giannini Rubber material Virginia San Fratello, Emily
Berkeley. development: Ronald Rael, Licht, Nick Buccelli, Kent
Picoroco Wall in Virginia San Fratello Wilson Cement material
GEOtube Tower 28–29 Orange 81–83 Acknowledgments: development: Ronald Rael
Project team: Ronald Rael, Project team: Ronald Rael, Special thanks to Tom Acknowledgments:
Virginia San Fratello, Virginia San Fratello, Rosenmayer and Lehigh Special thanks to Dr. Mark
Kent Wilson Salt material Seong Koo Lee Technologies, Inc. Ganter at the Solheim RP/
development: Ronald Rael, Acknowledgments: RM Lab at the University
Virginia San Fratello Special thanks to Saltygloo 18, 22–27 of Washington, Ehren
Design: Thom Faulders of MakerBot for production. Project team: Ronald Rael, Tool, Professor Richard
Faulders Studio Virginia San Fratello, Shaw at UC Berkeley,
Planter Bricks 152 Seong Koo Lee, Eleftheria
Damask Wall 90–93 Project team: Ronald Rael, the Department of Art
Stavridi Salt material Practice at UC Berkeley,
Hairline Drawing 94–95 Virginia San Fratello, development: Ronald
Project team: Ronald Rael, Molly Reichert the Hellman Family Fund,
Rael, Virginia San Fratello Professor Claudia Ostertag
Virginia San Fratello, Acknowledgments: Acknowledgments: Special
Barrak Darweesh Special thanks to Dr. Mark at UC Berkeley, San Jose
thanks to Dr. Mark Ganter State University, and
Ganter at the Solheim at the Solheim RP/RM
Involute Wall 110–11, 175 RP/RM Lab at the Luxology
Picoroco Block 96, 112–13 Lab at the University
University of Washington of Washington, Ehren Star Lounge 2, 72, 77–79
Quake Column 108–9
Project team: Ronald Rael, Planter Tiles 136–37 Tool at the Department Design team: Ronald Rael,
Virginia San Fratello Project team: Ronald Rael, of Art Practice at UC Virginia San Fratello,
Acknowledgments: Virginia San Fratello, Berkeley, the Department Mona Ghandi Fabrication
The Involute Wall, Quake Kent Wilson, Alexander of Architecture at UC team: Bre Pettis, Rob
Column, and Picoroco Schofield Cement material Berkeley, the Department Steiner, Sam Klemmer,
Wall in Sand were made development: Ronald Rael of Design at San Jose Elizabeth Randel, Geo
possible by ExOne and State University, Mark Salas, Nathan Worth, Steve
were on display as part of Poroso 40 Kelly, Kwang Min Ryu, and Gonzalez, Anthony DiMare,
the 3D Printer World Expo Project team: Ronald Rael, Chaewoo Rhee Sebastian Misiurek,
in Los Angeles, CA, in 2014. Virginia San Fratello, Meemo Acknowledgments:
Molly Wagner, Victoria Sawdust Screen 36–38, 176 Special thanks to Rob,
Marc Metamorphosis 50, 59 Leroux Wood material Project team: Ronald Rael, Bre, and the bold team
SCIN Cube 126 development: Ronald Rael, Virginia San Fratello, at Bold Machines who
Seed (P_Ball) 134–35 Virginia San Fratello Molly Wagner, Stephanie printed the Star Lounge at
Project team: Ronald Rael, Murri, Deanna the MakerBot BotFarm in
Virginia San Fratello, Kent The Hut Was Never Molkenbuhr, Victoria Brooklyn, NY
Wilson Cement material Primitive 86–87 Leroux Wood material
development: Ronald Rael Project team: Ronald Rael, development: Ronald Wood Block 32, 44
Chardonnay material Virginia San Fratello, Rael, Virginia San Fratello Design: Anthony Giannini
development: Ronald Rael, Kent Wilson, Alexander Acknowledgements: Wood material
Virginia San Fratello Schofield  Special thanks to San Jose development: Ronald Rael,
Design: Andrew Kudless State University and Lily Virginia San Fratello
Rubber Haeckel Forbes Shafroth. Research
of Matsys Bowl 70–71 was made possible
Newsprint 39 Rubber Pouf 62, 68–69 by a grant from the
Project team: Ronald Rael, Rubber Thingies 66–67 Environmental Protection
Anthony Giannini Project team: Ronald Rael, Agency. 171
 Notes
Introduction 4 “Strength and Microstructure Properties of Spent
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-ff8bd8dfdd45.
Rubber
Salt 1 “Worlds Biggest Tyre Graveyard,” Daily Mail, last
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2 Pliny the Elder, Natural History, bk. 31, 73–92. /article-2337351/Worlds-biggest-tyre-graveyard
-Incredible-images-Kuwaiti-landfill-site-huge-seen
Sawdust -space.html.
1 Joachim Radkau, Wood: A History (Cambridge, UK: 2 “Advancing Sustainable Materials Management 2013
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_smm_fs.pdf. Sports Forever,” History, last modified January, 20,
2016, www.history.com/news/the-3500-year-old
Coffee, Tea, and Wine -rubber-ball-that-changed-sports-forever.
1 “World Coffee Trade-Conversions and Statistics,” 5 John Tully, The Devil’s Milk: A Social History of
International Trade Centre, www.intracen.org/coffee Rubber (New York: New York University Press, 2011),
-guide/world-coffee-trade/conversions-and-statistics/ 32.
and “Trade Statistics—June 2017,” International 6 United States Synthetic Rubber Program, 1939–1945,
Coffee Organization, www.ico.org. In 2016, 14.8 commemorative booklet, National Historic Chemical
million 60-kilogram bags were produced. Each bag Landmarks program, American Chemical Society,
corresponds to 195 kilograms of cherry fruit and skin: 1998.
14.8 million × 195 = 2,886 million kilograms or 2.886 7 “U.S. Synthetic Rubber Program,” American Chemical
billion kilograms. Society, last accessed June 16, 2017, www.acs
2 Scafé Fabrics, www.scafefabrics.com/en-global. .org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry
3 “Re-worked Brews Up Furniture from Recycled Coffee /landmarks/syntheticrubber.html.
Grounds,” Inhabitat, inhabitat.com/re-worked-brews 8 “Materials,” Michelin, last modified 2017, thetiredigest
172 -up-furniture-from-recycled-coffee-grounds/. .michelin.com/an-unknown-object-the-tire-materials.
9 “MicroDyne,” Lehigh Technologies, last modified 2017, 5 Adrian Forty, Concrete and Culture: A Material History
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1 Lee Tin Sin, Abdul R. Rahmat, and W. A. W. A. Rahman, com/concrete/equipment-products/forms
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Applications (Oxford: Elsevier, 2015), 5. -formula-tips-for-success.
2 Bettina Wassener, “Raising Awareness of Plastic
Waste,” New York Times, last modified August 14, Clay
2011, www.nytimes.com/2011/08/15/business/energy 1 Pamela B. Vandiver, Olga Soffer, Bohuslav Klima, and
-environment/raising-awareness-of-plastic-waste Jiři Svoboda, “The Origins of Ceramic Technology at
.html. Dolní Věstonice, Czechoslovakia,” Science 246, no.
3 Lee, Rahmat, and Rahman, Polylactic Acid, 3. 4933 (1989): 1002–8.
2 “Clay May Have Been Birthplace of Life on Earth, New
Sand Study Suggests,” Science Daily, www.sciencedaily
1 Michael Welland, Sand: The Never-Ending Story .com/releases/2013/11/131105132027.htm.
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), 3 “Jomon Culture (ca. 10,500–ca. 300 B.C.),”
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.com/2015/03/illegal-sand-mining/.
4 Welland, Sand, 234. Recipes
5 Marcus Kayser, “Solar Sinter,” last modified 2011, 1 The recipes suggested here are adapted from and
www.markuskayser.com/work/solarsinter/. courtesy of the Recipes for Powder Printers Wiki
available under GNU Free Documentation License 1.2.
Cement See reprap.org/wiki/Powder_Printer_Recipes.
1 James Mitchell Crow, “The Concrete Conundrum,” 2 Gareth Williams, “Creating Lasting Values,” in The
Chemistry World, March 2008, 62. Persistence of Craft: The Applied Arts Today, ed. Paul
2 Vince Beiser, “The World’s Disappearing Sands,” Greehalgh (Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press,
New York Times, last modified June 23, 2106, https:// 2003), 61.
www.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/opinion/the-worlds
-disappearing-sand.html.
3 Ana Swanson, “How China Used More Cement in
Three Years Than the US Did in the Entire Twentieth
Century,” Washington Post, last modified March
24, 2015, www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk
/wp/2015/03/24/how-china-used-more-cement-in
-3-years-than-the-u-s-did-in-the-entire-20th
-century/.
4 Sanford Kwinter, “Is Concrete Dead or Alive,” in Solid
States: Concrete in Transition, ed. Michael Bell and
Craig Buckley (New York: Princeton Architectural
Press, 2010), 39. 173
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