That said, I did improve with practice. I was particularly proud of my wineglass, with its tapered cone. I became obsessed with the design software, spending hours squashing spheres and hollowing out cylinders. I downloaded some of the hundreds of free, publicly shared designs (though my wife nixed the Tetris-themed earrings).

I found myself almost giddy after every successful print: Yes, I created this napkin ring! I can make anything. I am a god and bright blue plastic is my universe!

The power can lead to narcissism. You think Americans in the Facebook era take excessive photos of ourselves? Get ready for selfie statues. At a 3-D printer store in NoHo run by Makerbot, you can get 3-D scans of your head (four cameras simultaneously snap photos of you from different angles). I got one of my 7-year-old son and printed a fist-size orange plastic bust of him. At home, we converted his head into a salt shaker for the dinner by poking a hole in the top of his plastic skull and adding some Morton’s.

If my table setting was going to look at all respectable, I’d need to call in the pros. I asked Mr. Lipson if I could hire him and his team to help.

What a difference a Ph.D. makes. They sent back blueprints for the cutlery — a fork and spoon made of lacy, spiraling steel. I told the engineers that my wife likes Italy, so they sent Italian-themed designs. A wineglass inspired by a Roman column, with Corinthian flourishes. A candleholder influenced by Venetian gondola poles, adorned with Julie’s favorite flower, the peony.

I showed the images to my wife. She paused. “You might have gone a little over the top with the Italian theme,” she said. “I think we have different agendas here. You want personalized designs that could only happen with 3-D printing. I want stuff we will actually use more than once.” Mr. Lipson printed most of my dinnerware at a New York-based company called Shapeways, which has fancy, cutting-edge 3-D printers that work with metal and ceramics. Again, it’s not cheap. The cost for my fork, for instance? $50.

I couldn’t afford a 3-D-printed dinner tuxedo, but Mr. Lipson offered to design a tie. “It’ll be a bit like chain mail,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to blow my nose on it. But it will work.” A few weeks later, the tie arrived: a long swath made entirely of white interlocking rings of nylon. I had trouble adjusting the tie, so I wore it loose and low, like a young banker after a few too many vodka tonics.