A Belgian fashion design student has brought an interesting 3D printed glasses project to his Fashion Academy runway. Could this be the future of how we make glasses?

Dávid Ring, a student from Antwerp Fashion Academy, reached out to i.materialise in order to get help for his 3D printed design project.

Materialise concept designer Nils Faber decided to help Ring co-create some colorful glasses which are entirely 3D printed – even the lenses.

The company say on their website: “We are always on the lookout for inspiring young designers, and we thought Dávid showed great potential!”

In order for the project to be created, Ring took his sketches and paper mock-ups of the glasses and some fabric samples to Faber.

They managed to then convert these sketches into 3D printable models which could be sent to the company’s additive manufacturing facility in order to create the final glasses.

The glasses were shown off at the university’s fashion department annual fashion show by models who walked the runway in student-designed clothing.

How Were the Luxury Glasses Created?

Two different 3D printing technologies were used in order to create the five unique pairs of glasses.

For the frames, a laser sintering process was used and the brightly transparent frames were printed using a stereolithography process which provided a very high quality.

Impressively enough, all of the frames were 3D printed as a single piece which meant as soon as they were printed, they were practically ready to wear. There is a huge benefit here as the glasses required no hinges or screws to assemble.

For the fashion show, it was essential that the glasses were made from very bright colors so that they would match Ring’s clothing designs, including his monochromatic dresses and coats.

Thanks to 3D printing, the clothes have a great mixture of past fashion trends as well as modern technology, giving all of the looks an interesting twist.

As these glasses have simply been created for Ring’s final project, you won’t be able to get your hands on any soon. However, hopefully they will give an example of how 3D printing can be used to create gorgeous glasses in the future.

If you’re interested in finding out more, make sure to take a look at Ring’s Instagram account to see more of his style and creation. Or, read more about the custom glasses and designs on the Materialise blog.

images: materialise Blog