BCN3D
ZER Collection BCN3D
ZER Collection garment pieces being printed on the BCN3D Sigma machine.
BCN3D’s Sigma R19 extrusion 3D printer has been harnessed by Spanish fashion brand ZER Collection to help produce 12 outfits which were debuted at the most recent Madrid Fashion Week.
Fashion designers Ane Castro and Núria Costa, co-founders of ZER Collection, designed the pieces to have a minimal, futuristic and urban aesthetic. Castro and Costa founded the company back in 2017 and have been using BCN3D’s 3D printing technology for about a year to take advantage of advanced design capabilities and the potential to be more sustainable.
The pair have enjoyed being able to digitise patterns in order to produce only the necessary fabric, which, in turn, allows them to reduce material waste. Typically, around 30% of the fabric used when creating a garment goes to waste, whereas with 3D printing, waste is reduced to almost zero. Further benefits to implementing the Sigma machine include the machine’s IDEX technology which allows the printing of two materials with two different sets of properties at a time – ZER Collection has particularly enjoyed being able to print flexible grades like TPU.
BCN3D
BCN3D ZER Collection
ZER Collection designs featuring 3D prints introduced on the Samsung Ego catwalk, during Madrid Fashion Week.
As an aside to their printing of garment pieces, ZER Collection is also recycling the materials from used garments by melting the plastics into a printable filament and re-using the material to help produce new outfits.
“[3D printing] opens a field of possibilities within the design of fabrics, providing them with functionalities that cannot be achieved without the use of this technology, from an elasticity that we can control and modify depending on our needs to protection against different impacts,” commented Castro and Costa. “We believe that the use of 3D printing represents a revolution in fashion, in environmental care and in society.”
