4,500 3D-printed ceramic tiles cover the facade of the ‘Cabin of Curiosities’ in Oakland, an experimental structure showing off how beautiful additive manufacturing can be. The facade consists of two different types of tiles by independent 3D printing studio Emerging Objects: the ‘Planter Tile’ and the ‘Seed Stitch Tile.’ Consisting of sawdust, Portland cement, corn-based bio-plastics and chardonnay grape skins, the tiles create a tactile living surface full of succulents ideal for the Northern California climate.

The ‘Seed Stitch’ tiles mimic the knitting technique for which they’re named, intentionally printed at high speeds to encourage the sort of non-uniformity you’d find in handmade objects – an interesting twist, considering the fact that precision is typically one of the most prized aspects of 3D printing technology. No two ‘Seed Stitch’ tiles are exactly the same.

Inside, the firm has lined the walls and ceiling with translucent ‘Chroma Curl Wall’ tiles with custom relief textures. Additional 3D-printed objects created by Emerging Objects, like lamps and furniture, are scattered throughout the room. ‘Cabin of Curiosities’ is presented as a potential component of a solution to the Bay Area’s severe housing shortage.

Emerging Objects, which was founded by Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello, professors at the University of California Berkeley and San Jose University, hopes to showcase the versatility of 3D-printed objects.

“These are not just investigations into testing materials for longevity or for structure, but also a study of aesthetics. We see the future as being elegant, optimistic, and beautiful.”

When 3D printers are widely accessible and affordable, will we see another industrial revolution, enabling us to manufacture just about everything we need on demand? Progress made in 3D printing thus far looks promising. Designers, engineers, architects and even novices are printing everything from fully functional human hearts and custom biodegradable shoes to full-scale architecture and bicycle bridges. One designer even printed himself a large-format camera based on three models he couldn’t afford.

Beating Artificial Heart

Created by researchers at ETH Zürich, this 3D-printed silicone heart beats almost like a real one, and though it’s not yet considered a viable long-term replacement, it can help keep a patient’s blood flowing while they’re waiting for a donor organ. Right now, the material can only withstand about 45 minutes of usage, but the team sees it as a proof of concept showing a way forward for artificial hearts in the future.

Ceramic Constellation Pavilion

Made entirely of 3D-printed terra-cotta bricks with a unique shape that allows them to slot together without conventional brick bonding techniques, ‘Ceramic Constellation Pavilion’ gives us a glimpse at what we might be able to achieve with 3D-printed architecture in the decades to come. The structure was created by the University of Hong Kong’s Department of Architecture along with Sino Group. “In a context that has largely been shaped by standardization and mass production, the project seeks to overcome the constraints of today’s architectural production through the introduction of a structure made entirely of non-standard components.”

Robotic Sign Language Arm

Shortages of sign language interpreters internationally (and the difficulty of finding one on the spot) led the students behind Project Aslan to seek better ways to bridge the communication gap between the hearing and deaf communities. This robotic sign language hand is one result, using 3D printing to make it more affordable and easy to build. The robot receives information from a local network to activate its joints, allowing it to interpret written language into sign language. It’s not meant to replace human interpreters, but rather step in when they aren’t available, and can be used to teach sign language, too.

Digital Grotesque II 3D-Printed Grotto

Designed entirely by algorithms, ‘Digital Grotesque II’ is a 3D-printed pavilion made of 7 tons of printed sandstone, with an incredible 1.35 billion surfaces. It’s another look at how we could achieve unprecedented complexities, porosities and spatial depth in future architecture using 3D printing and other new methods of fabrication as robotics become more accessible.

Flying Iron Man Suit

Considering the optimism and rapid rate of progress in the 20th century, many of us expected to have cooler toys by now. Are we finally about to get a suit that lets us fly? Kind of. The Iron Man suit by Gravity Industries is set to be 3D printed in metal, with six miniature jet engines mounted to the arms and back for vertical takeoff and flight. However, it’ll literally take an Iron Man to wear the thing, as it takes enormous strength to control the jets. The suit itself weights up to 90 pounds.

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It’s really easy to lose a chunk of your day getting lost in the hypnotizing effects of these trippy 3D-printed sculpture animations by artist John Edmark. Drawing from spiral patterns and numerical sequences often found in natural objects like pine cones, cacti, sunflowers and seashells, the objects seem to shift and change before your eyes when spun under a strobe light. Watching the videos of the sculptures in motion, it’s hard to believe these aren’t digital animations.

“Unlike a 3D zoetrope, which animates a sequence of small changes to objects, a bloom animates as a single self-contained sculpture,” says Edmark. “The bloom’s animation effect is achieved by progressive rotations of the golden ratio, phi, the same ratio that nature employed to generate the spiral patterns we see in pinecones and sunflowers. The rotational speed and strobe rate of the bloom are synchronized so that one flash occurs every time the bloom turns 137.5 degrees (the angular version of phi.) Each bloom’s particular form and behavior is determined by a unique parametric seed I call a phi-nome.”

The artist explains that much of his work celebrates the patterns underlying space and growth, explored through kinetic sculptures and transformable objects. Highly precise mathematics come into play in both the design and fabrication of each object, more to ask questions about spatial relationships that can only be answered with geometrically exacting constructions than to put that precision on display or “exalt the latest technology.”

It’s a cool way to utilize 3D-printed objects, though, and if you want to play with the effect yourself, you can even purchase the individual shapes from Edmark via Shapeways. He offers a tutorial to repeat the results at Instructables.

Take DIY home decor to a whole new level with 3D printing, whether you’re just purchasing a pre-printed geometric aquarium ornament or custom-designing an object you just can’t find anywhere else. This small-scale, low-impact manufacturing model makes it easy to produce all sorts of complex items, from lampshades and mini greenhouses to replacement parts for broken objects. Print them yourself if you can, or just browse the thousands of ‘digitally hand-crafted’ 3D-printed products on sites like Shapeways.

Aquarium Flora

‘Waterscapes’ by Haruka Misawa is a series of 3d printed objects inspired by aquatic plant life, intended for use in aquariums for a minimalist look that’s still fun and functional for fish. In addition to sculptural creations mimicking coral, the objects include bubbles of air that fit within the aquariums to make surface-growing aquatic plants the visual centerpiece.

Cityscape Light Bulbs

Cityscapes sprout from the tips of LED light bulbs in the ‘Huddle’ series by designer David Graas, available for purchase at Layers. “Just like the penguins in the Antarctic huddle to survive the extreme cold during the winter time also people have taken on huddling as a strategy for survival. The mega city, despite its many problems, seems to be our destined habitat now that resources are becoming scarce. It also holds the key to a sustainable future with its concentration of information, technology and talent.”

Screw It Vase

A slightly curved, connected collection of twelve universal PET bottle screw tops turns a dozen used plastic bottles into a collective vase, each bottle holding one or two stems of flowers and greenery. You can use bottles of various colors and sizes, as long as the three center bottles supporting the weight of the collective vase are the same size.

Tardigrade Bottle Opener

Anyone who already knows what a tardigrade (aka ‘water bear’) is will love this bottle opener, and the rest just need to watch this video about the strangest creature to ever be sent to outer space. Available in a variety of steel colors at Shapeways, it’s definitely an unusual item to have in your house.

Flexible Mini Greenhouse Dome

Got access to your own 3D printer, or a shared one? Try your hand at building some of the thousands of items that have been made available online in the form of printable STL files. This one will print out a kit of parts to build a flexible mini greenhouse dome with a geometric pot, perfect for seed starting.

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Ultra-strong and incredibly versatile carbon fiber can be woven by robots in a scale as small as furniture and as large as a stadium, a technological advance that could represent the fourth industrial revolution. This fiber-reinforced composite is typically formed in molds, but programming robots to weave it could totally change the way objects and buildings are designed and created. These carbon fiber creations represent this new construction method as well as 3D-printed carbon fiber products and the more time-consuming technique of hand-wrapping up to a mile of carbon fiber for just one piece of furniture.

Robot-Woven Pavilion by ICD + ITKE

Architect and researcher Achim Menges, who heads up the Institute for Computational Design (ICD) at the University of Stuttgart, is developing software to make robotic construction more intuitive, and his team has built a series of carbon fiber pavilions to show off the technology. We’re at a phase where the full capabilities of the material and method haven’t yet been unlocked, he says, because experiments are still mimicking old materials. To build the pavilions, they robots draw lengths of carbon and glass fiber through a resin bath and wind it around metal scaffolding in a particular pattern. The resin-coated structures are cured in a massive oven and then detached from the framework.

3D Printed Cirin Rubber Band Car

Carbon fiber has been around for decades, typically made by bonding carbon atoms into crystals and then forming the result into loose or woven carbon filaments. It’s often mixed with polymers to create composite materials, and we’re used to seeing it in cars, gloves and all sorts of everyday items, but new technology is broadening its applications. Take, for example, the Cirin, a modern take on the rubber band-powered toy car. A group of college students at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA made its shell with a 3D printer, giving us a peek at the capabilities of this particular forward-thinking combo.

Hammock-Shaped Carbon Fiber Bathtub

One example of the ‘mold’ technique of forming and curing carbon fiber is this stunning hanging bathtub by Splinter Works, which is fixed to walls with steel brackets and paired with a tall faucet. Layers of carbon fiber are arranged on top of a foam core to insulate the tub, which can be adjusted in size to fit a specific space.

Carbon Fiber Eames Sofa

Designer Matthew Strong replicates the classic Eames shell sofa of the late 1950s in carbon fiber form, but instead of using a robot to weave it, he has woven it himself by hand using a traditional chair caning pattern for a lightweight yet strong result.

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