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orbisvicistoday at 7:35 AM1 replyview on HN

If only, but wouldn't dimensions work just as well as pattern/silhouette visualizations? And finding retail dimensions is the hard part.

Hey, how close are we to being able to 3d print our own clothing?


Replies

altairprimetoday at 7:40 AM

Show me a sewing machine that can cut, sew, hem, iron, and qacheck a stretch-fabric garment, and I’ll show you a trillion dollar domestic manufacturing opportunity! Until then, look up the object called “sewing pattern”; it’s just a clothes blueprint that assumes you only have a 2D printer (scissors or a pizza cutter) and need a physical guide for the 2D fabric cutter (which will be you), an instruction sheet for sewing (also you), and the assumption that you understand that you should have ironed the fabric beforehand (throw it out and start over). Sewing is an extremely old human craft and may perhaps be the most difficult challenge faced by industrial robotics. Threading a loom for woven fabrics is equally as difficult and is still done by hand, too. Note that most clothing doesn’t fit in a normal desktop cutter because fabrics are typically 40” wide so you end up having to escort the entire process using tool-assisted human labor. They have, at least, figured out how to make robotic top-sewing machines for quilts, so as long as your stitches are in 2D and the fabric is already sewn together, you can have it sew the linear mile of stitches to finish the quilt (but only after weeks to month of piecework and assembly).