Europe's first 3D printed house welcomes residents

On April 29, Dutchmen Eliza Lutz and Harry Dekkers received a digital key - an application that allows you to open the front door of their new home with the touch of a button, according to The Guardian. This bungalow is 94 sq. meters with two bedrooms - the first fully habitable property in Europe created using 3D-printing technology. Upon entering the house, Harry and Louise said they felt safe here, like in a bunker.

Printed houses are coming into vogue. Over the past two years, such housing has already been built in France and the United States. However, the Dutch project is in many respects the first. Not only because its load-bearing walls are made with a 3D printer nozzle, but also because it is not social housing: tenants pay for it.

Construction firm Saint-Gobain Weber Beamix is going to build a small block of five such 3D houses near the Beatrix Canal in the Eindhoven suburb of Bosrejk. They will have a different area and a different look, but with streamlined shapes, each house will resemble a natural object like a stone. It would be difficult and expensive to build such unusual housing with traditional construction methods.

The house was printed by a robotic arm with a nozzle that squeezes out a specially formulated cement with the texture of whipped cream. After a few hours of operation, the nozzle head is changed. The point at which this occurs is visible in the cement drawing. The house consists of 24 concrete elements, which were printed at a factory in Eindhoven and then transported by truck to the construction site and placed on the foundation. After assembling the walls, the roof and window frames were added. The builders hope that by the time the last of the five houses is erected - it has three floors - all the work will be done on the spot.

3D houses have many benefits. They are more environmentally friendly than conventional ones because they require less cement. They do not need highly qualified bricklayers: everything is printed on a carbon copy on a computer. 3D printing allows you to create almost any design. Finally, such houses can be built very quickly. The boulder house, for example, was printed in 120 hours. The printer does not need to eat, does not need to sleep, it can issue around the house every five days.

In terms of money, Lutz and Dekkers pay 800 euros a month for their new home. This is cheap for the Netherlands - a couple would spend twice as much for an ordinary housing of the same quality. In their first 3D quarter, builders do not plan to make money. While they are working to their own detriment, honing technology for the future.