Amsterdam Developing 3D-Printed Canal House

Amsterdam is working towards the first 3D-printed canal home. It may sound like a dream to print-your-own-home, but architects in the Netherlands are planning to make this a reality.

Replacing bricks and mortar along with a construction crew is a customizable building plan that starts life as graphics on a computer screen, and transforms into an abode in the real world, thanks to advances in 3D technology.

While it is not quite reality yet, numerous teams of architects around the world are engaged in initiatives to work towards developing the globe's first 3D printed homes.

3D Printed Canal House

One of the companies involved is Dus Architects base in Amsterdam, who have plans to print a canal house for the Dutch capital. It is possibly worth considering the scale of what is being proposed. The 3D machine will not print a modest piece of jewellery, curtain ring or cup, but an entire building.

The marvel making this conceivable is a printer known as the KamerMaker. In Dutch, this translates as "room-maker".

Crafted from the remains of a shipping container, its shiny metallic exterior is six metres (19 ft 8 in) tall and would easily take up most of your typical siting room - not only a room maker, but a room filler.

Using different types of wood fibres and plastics, the machine uses computer-drawn plans to create the building's exterior walls, before the ceilings and other individual room parts, and finally its furniture.

3D Printing Kit

Like an enormous jigsaw, the pieces will then be assembled together on site; with their edges resembling Lego pieces and "sewing" the elements together with steel cabling. By the end of 2013, the building's façade will be fully printed and erected - but it will be a number of years before the project will be completed.

Hedwig Heinsman and Hans Vermeulen are the architects involved.

"We are makers at heart and a 3D printer offers us a DIY kit," says Ms Heinsman, while Mr Vermeulen adds his belief that his industry is "at the forefront of new industrial revolution".

While it is improbable that the KamerMaker house will be built as inexpensively as traditional mass-produced canal houses, the architects are hoping to treat the experiment as proof of 3D printing's unbound limits.

Image Copyright DUS Architects