The 3D printer that creates new clothes by recycling used ones

What if old clothes could be reused as raw material to produce new clothes? An idea as old as the world, but listen to the real news. The clothes can be made by a 3D printer

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What if old clothes could be reused as raw material to produce new ones clothes? An idea as old as the world, but listen to the real news. The dresses can be made by one Printer 3D.

All thanks to Joshua Harris who proposed this idea during a design competition, theElectrolux Lab, arriving in the semifinals.

Created together with a group of colleagues, the 3D printer for clothing is designed as a personal wall appliance, but one that could be electronically linked to fashion designers and clothing companies. The latter could sell their digital designs to be printed immediately at home.

Obvious question: what about cartridges? Here comes the beauty. To get new clothes, you can use old ones. Do not throw away your beloved and consummate one T-shirt. Just plug it into Harris's printer and voilà. A new boss is ready. Inside, the old clothes introduced are literally torn apart, broken down thread by thread and prepared for reuse.

To participate in the Electrolux competition, a solution had to be found to cope with the rapid urbanization of the population, with the drastic changes that our way of life will undergo by 2050.

Why the clothing printer? The philosophy behind the creation of the 3D printer, still only a project, is to encourage the production of clothing at home by reducing not only the clothes thrown away, but also the purchase of new ones. “We have found that the apparel industry makes extremely wasteful and inefficient use of our resources. The clothing is shipped to several places before being distributed to the consumer. Furthermore, the life span of a dress is only a few years, then it is neither disposed of nor reused " has explained Harris. In its most "extreme" hypothesis, this system could even eliminate the need for cabinets.

Not to mention having new clothes every day it would be a dream come true for fashionistas. The only flaw? For the moment it's just a concept ...

Francesca Mancuso

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