A few years ago, we were promised that 3D printing would transform the world. In 2011, the Economist featured a 3D-printed Stradivarius violin on its front page, claiming that 3D printing “may have as profound an impact on the world as the coming of the factory did.” These enormous hopes for digital fabrication, and especially 3D printing, may have seemed overinflated. But perhaps the impacts are finally materializing.

The last few years have seen a steady period of experimentation and incremental technical advances. Fabricators realised that 3D printing had many limitations that needed to be taken on board for its successful application. In addition, the public’s initial excitement seemed, to many, to be overblown. But despite this, enthusiastic claims about the technology should not be considered utterly absurd. The technology and its applications just need a bit more time, testing and evaluation to enter into our everyday lives.

Over the last decade, museums and other cultural institutions around the world have constituted one of the most exciting test-beds for 3D printing. This is probably driven by the nature of objects and sites which cultural institutions study, collect, and display. Given their fragility and historical importance, collection objects cannot be touched and are normally exhibited to people behind enclosed glass displays.

Please touch

But this is changing. One of the most well-known digital fabrication projects is the replica of Tutankhamun’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, made by the company Factum Arte. The replica–or facsimile, as the company calls it–allows tourists to experience the inside of the King’s tomb without harming the original burial site.

Meanwhile, the American Museum of Natural History has asked students to digitize, print, and assemble dinosaur bones and identify species like paleontologists do, and the MediaLab of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has created edible replicas of museum artifacts from ingredients like chocolate, cheese, and rice for visitors to enjoy through taste.

And in January, Google’s Arts and Culture institute, the nonprofit organization CyArk and the American 3D printing manufacturer Stratasys announced an extended collaboration on the Open Heritage project. They aim to bring important monuments and artifacts around the world to life by physically producing small-scale versions of cultural heritage sites.

All of these examples demonstrate the breadth of 3D-printing applications in cultural heritage. Some deployments might seem unusual. Others might spark discussions about the originality of artwork compared to “fake” reproductions or about the right to capture and widely distribute 3D-printable models of museum artifacts online. Nonetheless, they all seem to contribute to the same quest: enabling people to learn, enjoy, and better appreciate cultural heritage through multi-sensory experiences.