🏡 The first 3D-printed house made from soil

As a joint project, an Italian architecture studio and 3D printing company have created the very first 3D-printed home made from soil. It only took 200 hours to build this environmentally friendly house.

The house is the result of an assignment from the School of Sustainability. The assignment was to design a sustainable home built with on-site natural materials. Italy’s leading 3D printing firm Wasp along with Mario Cucinella Architects created Tecla, which is a shortening of “technology and clay”, thanks to the assignment.

This revolutionary house is 60 square meters (about 645 square feet) and was built with local soil in a zero-waste construction process. No transportation of material was needed, which meant a great environmental advantage. The 3D-printed house has 350 layers and is built with 60 cubic meters of natural material. Mario Cucinella Architects told Dezeen:

"Tecla responds to the increasingly serious climate emergency, to the need for sustainable homes and to the great global issue of the housing emergency that will have to be faced. Particularly in the context of urgent crises generated, for example, by large migrations or natural disasters."

FreeThink writes that the vibe of the 3D-printed house is both earthy and modern, without being rustic. It brings together a low-tech, natural feel with a futuristic aesthetic.

"The aesthetics of this house are the result of a technical and material effort. (I)t was not an aesthetic approach only. It is an honest form, a sincere form." Cucinella says in article on It's Nice That.

The house has big, round skylights for bringing in light instead of windows. To support the structure, the house has ridges. To make the house stand out even more, it has a tree sprouting through the center of the kitchen table. Cucinella told Dezeen:

"We like to think that Tecla is the beginning of a new story. It would be truly extraordinary to shape the future by transforming this ancient material with the technologies we have available today."

Photo: Iago Corazza via Dezeen.