A ceramic corridor demonstrates the endless possibilities of 3D printing in architecture

The New Delft Blue project in Delft, Netherlands takes its cue from Royal Delft Blue porcelain. The studio printed the structure in clay, not plastic. A paste of ceramic powder, water and binder is extruded through a nozzle layer by layer, so the wall grows as a stack of wet beads. The geometry stays open and cellular because the printer does not need a mold to hold the shape.

That freedom is the point. A corridor like this can carry a lattice that varies along its length, thick where it takes load and thin where it only screens. A mold would need a separate tool for every variation. Printing changes the file, not the tooling.

The hard part comes after printing. Wet clay shrinks as it dries, and it shrinks again in the kiln. A part printed at 300 mm can lose several percent of that length by the time it is fired. Designers compensate by scaling the model up, and by keeping wall sections even so the shrink is predictable across the whole piece.

Architectural scale also means the printer runs for days. A single corridor panel may take tens of hours, and the clay must stay workable the whole time. Humidity control around the machine matters as much as the toolpath.

Printed clay holds a shape, not a tolerance. As-fired ceramic parts typically land in the ±1–2% range on a linear dimension, and warpage shows up on long, thin sections. That is fine for a facade panel. It is not fine for a mating face, a bearing seat or a threaded insert.

This is where the two processes split. If a ceramic part needs a flat sealing face, a precise bore or a groove with a defined depth, we machine it after firing with diamond tooling. Alumina and zirconia cut cleanly with the right feed and coolant, but the setup costs more than aluminium because the tool wears fast and the part is brittle.

Green machining is the other option. You can mill the part while the binder still holds it together, before the kiln. The cut is much easier and the tool life is longer, but the part then shrinks during firing, so the machined feature moves with it. For features that only need to be roughly placed, green machining wins on cost.

A practical split: print the bulk shape, fire it, then diamond-grind only the datums and interfaces. You keep the geometric freedom of printing and pay for precision only where it touches something else.

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  As-fired ceramicGood for screens, panels and covers where ±1–2% is acceptable.
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  Green machiningCheap and fast, but features shift during firing.
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  Post-fire diamond grindingHolds ±0.005 mm on a machined metal fixture, not on the ceramic itself.
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  Hybrid assembliesCeramic body with a machined metal insert bonded or shrunk in.

Architectural clay is a building material. It is cheap, weathers well and takes glaze. It is not a structural engineering ceramic, and it should not be specified where the part sees impact, thermal shock or a tight fit.

Technical ceramics behave differently. Alumina (Al2O3) gives high stiffness, electrical insulation and good wear resistance at moderate cost. Zirconia (ZrO2) is tougher and takes a finer surface, which suits small precision parts. Silicon nitride and silicon carbide handle thermal cycling and abrasion, but they are expensive and slow to finish.

For most industrial parts that a customer describes as ceramic, the real requirement is one property: wear, insulation, weight or heat. Once that is named, the material choice usually narrows to one or two grades. If the part also needs a precision interface, a metal version in 6061, 316L or 17-4PH is often faster and cheaper than ceramic.

We quote both routes when it makes sense. Sending a ceramic drawing for a metal part that only needed hardness is a common and avoidable cost.

Keep wall sections even. A sudden change from 3 mm to 12 mm traps moisture and creates a shrink gradient, and that is where cracks start in the kiln. If a thick boss is needed, taper it into the wall over a long distance.

Avoid sharp internal corners. A radius of at least half the wall thickness spreads stress during cooling. Sharp corners concentrate it.

Give the part a flat base if it will be fired standing up. Warpage is worst on parts that only touch the kiln shelf at a few points. A continuous base ring supports the whole piece.

Plan the interfaces early. If the ceramic part bolts to a metal frame, decide the hole pattern, the insert type and the clearance before the model is frozen. Adding a metal insert later usually means a redesign, because ceramic cannot be tapped reliably at small sizes.

Surface texture is a design decision, not a default. A glazed face reads as tile, and a matte as-fired face reads as structural clay. Both are valid. They just need to be in the drawing.

A useful request includes the 3D file, the material grade, the surfaces that must be precise, and the environment the part sees. Temperature range, chemicals and load direction matter more than a general note about quality.

We run 127 high-precision CNC machines across three plants in Dongguan and Singapore, including 16 simultaneous 5-axis centers and a Ø400 mm rotary table. That covers the metal side of a hybrid part: the insert, the bracket, the flange or the fixture the ceramic sits in. Custom 3D printing covers the polymer and prototype route when a design is still moving.

For a metal part, the usual path is a quotation and DFM analysis within 12 hours, production starting within 24 hours, and parts shipping in 3–5 days. Tolerances to ±0.005 mm and finishes from Ra 0.2–0.8 μm are available on request. Every part is inspected before shipment, and inspection reports can be issued.

Uploads stay confidential, and an NDA is available on request. There is no minimum order quantity, so a single prototype and a 10,000-part run go through the same first step.