If you had the opportunity to stay in a hotel room constructed entirely by 3D printers, would you do it? Well if you’re planning a trip to the Philippines in the near future, you might just get a chance. The country’s Grand Lewis Hotel recently finished construction on a new addition — a suite that was made almost entirely by a massive concrete printer.
Located in Angeles City Pampanga, the Lewis Grand’s 3D-printed villa features two bedrooms, a jacuzzi room (which was also 3D-printed), and approximately 1,500 square feet of space. Officially, the entire villa measures in at roughly 34.5 feet by 41 feet, while featuring 10-foot high ceilings in the entire suite. Though perhaps this revolutionary room’s most impressive feature is the fact it took just 100 total hours of printing to complete, in addition to the time it took to install plumbing, rebar, and wiring.
UC Santa Barbara graduate Lewis Yakich, a material science engineer graduate and accomplished home builder in the United States, teamed up with renowned 3D-printed concrete expert Andrey Rudenko to come up with the design of the hotel’s addition. Aside from developing the room’s blueprints, the duo also worked tirelessly at creating the proper type of printer to use for the massive project. Due in large part to Rudenko’s history with printing in concrete — he did, after all, 3D print a castle — the process for creating the printing module took just two months, a timeline Rudenko even admits can be replicated in just a few weeks now. After testing the material and mixtures for one month, the duo got started on the revolutionary print.
“The Philippines is actually a great place for concrete printing because of the weather,” Yakich tells 3DPrint.com, “currently everything is made out of concrete, and it’s a third world country so it can do a lot of good in disaster zones, etc.”
Though construction already finished on the Grand Lewis Hotel addition, it’s unknown exactly when the room opens to the public and how much a night in the villa will cost. Its success did grab the attention of other businesses in the Philippines though, as Yakich was able to secure a contract to build low-income housing in the country — something he plans to start on in November. Considering how cost- and time-effective it was for Yakich to 3D-print an addition to his posh Filipino hotel, it seems likely his next housing contract won’t be his last.
