As 3D printing develops, the fashion industry could be next in line to harness the benefits of this emerging technology, revolutionising fashion design both creatively and sustainably.

Technology has an inescapable presence in modern-day life; it is everywhere, with human dependence on it growing stronger every day. When it comes to ever-evolving technological advancements, one that has gained considerable interest is 3D printing, with its techniques slowly filtering into numerous industries and opening up the doors of creative possibility.

3D printing, also known as additive manufacturing, involves the process of creating a physical object from a three-dimensional digital model. This digital model is used as the blueprint. The object is built using a layer-by-layer approach and is an additive process due to the thin layers of material slowly building up in succession to eventually form the 3D object.

3D printing is part of a bigger group of digital manufacturing technologies that are powering the fourth industrial revolution – also known as Industry 4.0. The fourth industrial revolution is facilitated by direct digital manufacturing and smart production, with newer technologies including artificial intelligence, augmented reality, advanced robotics, smart devices, and 3D printing the driving forces.

The concept of 3D printing was first envisioned in Japan in the 1980s by Dr. Hideo Kodama, who developed a way of ‘rapid prototyping’. He found a way of creating solid objects through the process of layering, using material that could be polymerised (solidified) by UV light. This was a breakthrough for product development and offered a glimpse into what the future of manufacturing might look like.

3D printing has been around for the last few decades, however, interest in the technology has only just started to advance. This developing interest could be a result of the emergence of new technologies, including artificial intelligence and Internet of Things (IoT) networked sensors, which both aid the speed and reliability of printing. 3D printing has also gained traction due to the various advantages it can offer businesses, including flexibility, cost efficiency, fast designing and minimal wastage.

The inception of 3D printing can now be seen everywhere with 3D printing being used to create houses, food and even organs.

The global 3D printing market is rapidly growing, with demand for the market driven by prototyping applications from a variety of industry sectors, notably healthcare, automotive, aerospace, and defence.

3d Printing and Fashion

The fashion industry is never one to miss an opportunity when it comes to cutting-edge design technology and has been experimenting with 3D printing for the last decade. Fashion designers want to be at the forefront of innovation and 3D printing technology provides them with the tools to fabricate the most adventurous designs. Many brands and designers are using this advancing technology to facilitate creative freedom and design things that once may have only been an imaginative dream.

Previously, 3D printing was limited to art pieces or haute couture when it comes to fashion design, with artists and designers creating intricate, complex and unique geometric designs restricted to the catwalk or art exhibitions. As the accessibility and capabilities behind 3D printing evolve, this limitation is changing; designers and innovators are realising the potential of this advancing technology and thinking about how they can use it at scale.

The first designer to experiment with 3D printing in fashion is fashion pioneer, researcher and designer, Danit Peleg, who made headlines in 2015 for being “the first designer in the world to create an entire collection using desktop 3D home printers for her graduate project at Shenkar College of Engineering and Design.”¹ The breakthrough of her collection was attributed to the use of the material FilaFlex, a new kind of filament that is both strong and flexible. Peleg’s first 3D-printed collection took over 2,000 hours to print and around 400 hours per outfit. Peleg’s passion for 3D printing has been recognised globally as she pushes to revolutionise fashion design and manufacturing and give birth to a new wave of sustainable fashion.

Since Peleg’s discovery, brands and designers globally have been experimenting with 3D printers, with designers now equipped with the tools to create the most challenging design concepts. Architects, engineers and researchers are teaming up with fashion designers globally to potentially reshape the future of fashion.

Iris Van Herpen, a designer from the Netherlands, and another pioneer in the world of 3D fashion printing, previously exhibited her 3D printed designs at the Met Gala in 2022, worn by the likes of Teyana Taylor, Winnie Harlow, and Fredrik Robertsson. Van Herpen’s 3D printed designs have also been featured on the catwalks for Paris, where she teamed up with premium ice cream brand Magnum to design a vegan-inspired 3D printed haute couture dress. Both Van Herpen and Peleg are pushing the boundaries for 3D printing in fashion and are even looking at smaller printing machines that could be used in people’s homes.

Major fashion brands are also experimenting with this advancing 3D printing technology. In 2018, Nike developed the world’s first running shoe with 3D-printed uppers, worn by athlete Eliud Kipchoge in the London Marathon. Adidas and vegan fashion designer Stella McCartney have also shown interest, having partnered with 3D manufacturing specialist Carbon to produce their limited edition Stella McCartney x Adidas Alphaedge 4D shoe, which featured a 3D printed midsole, printed with Carbon’s Digital Light Synthesis (DLS) 3D printer.

What could the future look like with 3d-printed fashion?

Imagine a guest who has been invited to a dinner party, but when they go to their wardrobe cannot find anything suitable to wear. In current times, the answer would be to go to the shop and buy the latest trend, however, this guest has a 3D printer. So instead, they browse the web, find an outfit they like, download the patterns and print it to size in the comfort of their own home.

The outfit would be printed from a collection of raw materials including plastics (ABS, PLA or TPU) which can be continuously melted down again after their use, ready to be used again. The 3D printer itself would be small and could easily sit on a desk. The price of these printers would probably start high, (complex 3D printers can cost $500,000), but as fashion adapts and this technology becomes normalised, these printers should become more affordable.  

Fashion, Sustainability and the Benefits of 3D Printing

Profit seems to be the overriding priority in the fashion industry, with fast fashion the main offender. Fast fashion brands and retailers, obsessed with mass production, produce clothes at an unprecedented rate with no infrastructure in place to process textile waste that exists in the world. The current model of fashion seriously implicates the stability and future of the planet. 3D printing could change this and provide a way of mitigating some of the industries polluting ways, allowing for fashion to co-exist with more sustainable practices.

This futuristic process of 3D printing would mitigate bulk ordering online, textile waste, overproduction and mass consumption. It could provide an alternative and sustainable solution to the world of fashion and offer an entirely disruptive approach to fashion.

Sustainability Benefits of 3D Printing

Reduces cut-offs and waste material

Approximately 10-20 per cent of textiles are wasted during garment manufacturing². This ‘pre-consumer waste’ is generated through painting/ weaving, colour and prototyping errors, cutting room scraps and leftover materials. This is a huge amount of generated waste, especially when considering it can take around 2,700 litres of water to make one T-shirt³. With 3D printing technology, less waste is generated when compared to traditional manufacturing due to the precisionary nature of the technology; clothes can be made with a specific amount of material without any uncertainty over the quantity or volume of resources required.

One example that can be mentioned here is Danish clothing brand, Son of a Tailor, which is on a mission to tackle production waste and is utilising 3D technology to do just this. The brand developed a 3D knitted, made-to-order pullover, which utilises 3D technology to knit the product in one piece. By doing so and personalising the order for the consumer, unnecessary pre-consumer waste is eliminated.

Promotes Upcycling of Material

Currently, technology is not advanced enough to continuously recycle textile fibres, with a 2022 McKinsey Report stating, “less than one per cent of textile waste is fibre-to-fibre recycled due to several barriers to scale that need to be overcome.” One of these barriers surrounds the problem of recycling garments that are made from more than one material source.

3D-printed clothes could be made from material that is both recyclable and biodegradable. Clothes could be printed and melted down after use, with the material reused for the next outfit. This futuristic concept has not fully materialised yet, however, Julia Koerner, founder of JK Design GmbH, a company that specialises in digital design for 3D-Printing, notes that it could be possible in the not-too-distant future⁴.

Reduces raw Materials

The intensive processes which are used to source raw materials for garments are disastrous for the environment. It has been suggested that 3D printing could save up to 90 per cent of natural resources⁵, benefiting the environment in astronomical ways. Materials could even be sourced from plastic bottle waste; for example, American brand Ministry of Supply transformed 1.2 million water bottles into 3D filaments, therefore, diverting them from landfills and preventing 21 tonnes of CO₂ from being emitted into the atmosphere.

Additional Benefits Of 3d Printing

Personalisation & Customisation

3D printing comes with several design benefits, one being the customisable nature of the technology. One size certainly does not fit all, especially when each brand has a different sizing chart. 3D printing poses the perfect solution for this as clothes can be personalised and designed for each consumer, adapting them to the individual customers’ needs. Additional benefits of this include that brands would not have to mass produce items as they would be made as orders come in and customers would not be affected by out-of-stock products, due to products being created after they have been ordered.

Creative Exploration & Fabric Innovation

3D printing allows for the once impossible, to be made possible. The technology equips designers with creative freedom, and they are now able to create products that may have seemed too complex or would have been too expensive to make. With 3D printing, they can design clothes with intricate patterns and details, with a high level of detail and accuracy.

Challenges Of 3D Printing

3D printing is not without its challenges and one of the problems with 3D printing in fashion involves the limitation of materials that are compatible with the 3D printers. Currently, the materials compatible with the printer mostly include plastics which are toxic to the surrounding environment if disposed of incorrectly and also affect air quality and human health if vapourised at room temperature.

Another problem is the material being used lacks comfort and flexibility, meaning that clothes are not currently ready to be produced for casual wear. However, innovators and researchers are working on this and pushing for comfortable, flexible materials that can be produced with ease.

Finally, for 3D-printed clothes to fully take off, the entire fashion market paradigm would have to shift. It is currently built on mass production and mass consumption, and shifting the industry so that it encompasses on-demand, customisable, recyclable products is going to take time.

Conclusion

3D printing provides the fashion industry with a feasible, efficient and sustainable way to produce clothes that mitigates many flaws of the industry’s intense production line. 3D-printed clothes have just begun their journey, and so as more designers discover the incredible opportunity that 3D printers offer, 3D-printed clothes could start appearing more in the mainstream. The fashion industry needs to transform its ways as the world shifts its prioritisation towards sustainability and circularity, and 3D printing could play a pivotal role in its transformation.