Can I Use 3D Printing to Plan My Wedding?

Congratulations! Your partner said YES! You’re both ready to move onto the next chapter of your lives together! The possibilities are endless!

Now you want to have that perfect wedding that will provide you and your partner with the fondest memories.
You just need to find a dress, book a venue, plan the table settings, hire a decorator...Oh my, that list gets long. But you’re brave! You press forward and begin to set your budget! Wow…It can get tough to make the big day happen on a budget. Well. hmmm…Your cousin is a florist. And your best friend can make some great cupcakes. You’ve got this! 

What else can we do? Let’s see…Right! You have a 3D Printer! It’s sitting on its little desk or shelf. Waiting for you to remember it’s there!
Well. How can that fit in the plan? There must be something you can do with it? Let’s explore!

We’re going to talk about how you can:

1- Plan the big day with 3D printing

2- Decorate like no one else

3- Limbo under that budget!

1: Plan with Printing!

Planning can be a big roadblock. The anxiety that so often comes with it can lead to some serious procrastination. Sometimes you just have to visualize something in order to get started. So here’s our first opportunity for a printed solution!
Grab your tape measure or get in touch with your venue of choice and ask for the dimensions of the space! Then open up a trusty free program like TinkerCAD (or use something like MentaPrints, which offers basic design services) and get to work! 

Don’t get too focused on the details. Just enough to get a feel for your space. Simple shapes for tables and seating arrangements and just an outline of the space for walls!

Scale it all down and export those wonderfully simple models as printable files! And there you have it! You can get a little scaled preview of your own wedding! Move things around until you’re totally satisfied that it feels right for your big day!

2: Decorate like no one else

The key to making a wedding unique and memorable is in the little details.

You can print custom vases, reserved seating signage, and even custom wedding cake toppers. The possibilities are really endless!

Here are some examples we found of items you can print!:

Lithophane creation in lithophanemaker.com

- Lithophanes
These use the varying thickness of the material to create stunning backlit images of your special day! We found a great place to get quick STLs from images!
Check out lithophanemaker.com.

This website offers a user friendly interface as well as instructions on how to print the best lithophanes! It really gets as simple as loading your image and adjusting your final lithophane in real time on your screen!

- Table numbers and place cards
Here we printed some beautiful place numbers by Thingiverse user maandren. There are hundreds of models you can find online to match your style. Scale it up or down and make seating and catering a breeze! If you don’t see a design you like you can always design one or commission a custom design!

- Table Decorations

If there is a 3D printing community, then there are vase models. With numerous design options and variations to choose from, there’s no better way to go when you want a truly unique experience for your guests. (our favorite vase models are by Thingiverse user Virtox!)

And it doesn’t stop at the vases and centerpieces. You can get unique designs for everything all the way down to your napkin rings! Explore and see what’s out there!

(left) by Thingiverse user Virtox

- Cake Topper

Of course a custom 3D printed wedding would not be complete without a wedding cake topper.

If you want to go with a simple “Mr./Mrs.” cake topper like this one you have the freedom to do that with 3D printing!
Or, if your budget allows for it, you can get custom 3D scans of you and your partner with services that offer full-body 3D scanning or you can scan yourselves with apps like Trnio to make meshes which can be turned into files for printing! 
(check out this awesome full-body 3D scanner if you’re interested in doing this type of thing for other people! )

3: Limbo under that budget!

We mentioned that 3D printing can save you money, but just how much could you save? Well let’s break out some trusty math.

With some of the items above as examples, we ran it through a 3D print cost calculator. For this calculation we used Hatchbox PLA (1.75mm diameter) which sells for $24.99 on their website at the time of writing. We sliced the files using Cura and got the estimated filament weight. We then ran that data through this 3D printing cost calculator. We didn’t factor in labor time as this is your own investment into your wedding day.

All the non-printed bulk items we found have been broken down by per-unit cost as some of them are sold in bulk quantities.

Table numbers:
In this comparison, we chose to compare the table numbers by Thingiverse user maandren with some we found on Amazon. These actually came out very close with some very cheap options available for both amazon and the 3D printed designs. Not going to be a major budget saver but it goes to show that every little detail counts.
3D Printed table numbers: ~$.99
Amazon table numbers: ~$1.07

Centerpiece vase:
Here we used a model by Thingiverse user mrice in order to calculate a roughly estimated cost of material. This was compared to a generic glass vase which you can buy at a dollar store.
This is the price per-unit and it’s worth noting that the dollar store vases we found were typically sold in multi-packs.
3D printed vase: ~$3.20
Dollar store vase: ~$5

Cake Topper:

This particular example shows the wide disparity between the cost of printing and the cost of buying pre-made. We found this take on a popular design on Thingiverse by user joecrop. Then we found a similar design on Amazon. Both are elegant calligraphic designs but there is a major difference:
3D printed cake topper: ~$1.50
Amazon cake topper: ~$12.70

Overall, if we assume you have 15 table settings and only need one cake topper, this little example list shows a total of almost $40 saved! That’s comparing it to some of the cheapest options we could find online! And the best part is, if you don’t like the design, you can create your own or ask someone you know with 3D modeling skills to bring your vision to life!

Conclusion:

When it comes to 3D printers, the possibilities really can be endless. The applications we’ve listed are just a few of the many that exist. 3D printing creates an affordable opportunity to make your wedding unique.

A table number or a vase won’t be the star of your wedding. A scale model of your reception won’t be what you tell everybody about for years to come. But every little preparation and every little piece will be a part of the beginning of your journey together. And the key to making those little details is right there. Your printer. Sitting on its little desk or shelf. Waiting for you to push “start print”.

So go out there and make your wedding into something you and your families will cherish forever. Let’s get printing!