If you happen to live in New York City and decide to take a summer stroll through Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, you’ll have the opportunity to take a seat on some one-of-a-kind 3D printed furniture. The artistic collection of seats, dubbed “RRRolling Stones”, were designed by the Ithaca-based design studio HANNAH.
The 3D printed furnishings ended up winning the 2018 Folly/Function competition, an annual contest hosted by the Architectural League of New York. This last week, the distinctly shaped and sturdy seats were installed throughout the sculpture park, giving visitors a relaxing spot to sit back and enjoy the Manhattan skyline.
The design firm, founded by Cornell University professors Leslie Lok and Sasa Zivkovic, focused on versatility and modularity for this collection. Each seat has a unique graphic silhouette and can be rolled over to offer different seating positions.
HANNAH Uses Concrete 3D Printer to Construct Modular Furniture
Using a $5,000 steel-framed concrete 3D printer that was constructed with help from students at the Cornell Robotic Construction Laboratory (RCL), the team started fabricating the custom furnishings. The substrate is fed through a PVC hopper at the top and through the nozzle, which uses an auger to restrict the flow of concrete and a pulley and counterweight mechanism that allows the printing arm to quickly move up and down.
The concrete material is a blend of Portland cement, a plasticizer, which provides more elasticity, and nylon threads for increased strength. Despite the fact that the entire collection is made with this 3D printed concrete, each seat is unlike any of the others. This is due to various outside influences, such as machine vibrations, the viscosity of material, wind, the slope of the manufacturing floor and human error.
The smaller 3D printed pieces that HANNAH produced are freestanding, while the larger seats are embedded and reinforced with rebar structures. The fabrication process was completed at Cornell University before they were transported to the Socrates Sculpture Park.
If you want to lounge out on these 3D printed furnishings, you’re in luck, as the RRRolling Stones collection will be on display throughout the entire summer.
Source/Photos: The Architect’s Newspaper
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