Model Lindsay Ellingson wears a pair of 3-D printed wings. Image: Eli Schmidt Architect Bradley Rothenberg designed the delicate, lacy pattern using an algorithm that mimics the fractal shape of snowflakes. Image: Eli Schmidt The pattern was 3-D printed at Shapeways' factory in New York City. Image: Eli Schmidt Using the EOS Selective Laser Sintering printers, Shapeways was able to 3-D print the pattern in nylon. Image: Eli Schmidt Removing the snowflake pattern from a cake of nylon powder. Image: Eli Schmidt The resulting textile was extremely thin and delicate-looking, but strong. Image: Eli Schmidt The Victoria's Secret order at Shapeways. Image: Eli Schmidt The first prototype was printed at .8mm, which resulted in a textile that resembled fine lace. Image: Eli Schmidt The entire snowflake outfit was printed as separate, interlocking pieces of varying thickness that came together to form the larger garment. Image: Eli Schmidt

Every year during the Victoria’s Secret fashion show, a gaggle of genetically blessed supermodels struts down the runway wearing next to nothing. To be fair, they are wearing something: bras, underwear, impossibly high heels and the occasional pair of giant, extravagant wings.

Hold on a second. Wings?

If you’re not paying attention to the avian appendages jutting out from the models' backside, don’t worry. It's perfectly normal. But it’s also too bad, because aside from the women on stage, the elaborately-designed wings are the show's signature design element.

In the past, these have been made from all sorts of crazy stuff—hundreds of thousands of crystals, glowing, translucent plastics and the 50-inch plumes from a Chinese pheasant. But this year, one pair of wings got a very techy update. Victoria's Secret partnered with the 3-D printing gurus at Shapeways and Swarovski Crystal to craft a winter-themed pair of wings worn by model Lindsay Ellingson.

>The wings mimic the crystaline shape of snowflakes.

Architect Bradley Rothenberg designed the wings using a computer algorithm that mimic the crystaline shape of snowflakes, and next to the ultra-embellished wings that have been handcrafted with beading and feathers, the crystallized snowflake get-up looks almost understated. Using Processing, he sketched different snowflake organizations, aiming to make the entire garment transition from smaller, textile-like flakes around the stomach and bust to larger, more rigid designs around structural pieces like the arm and bustle. Rothenberg worked with Shapeways to take a full-body 3-D scan of Ellingson to ensure the bustier would be as form-fitting as possible. From there, the fractals were generated around her body shape, printed at Shapeways and encrusted in thousands of glittering micro crystals.

Wrapped tightly around Ellingson’s midriff, the wings and corset look dangerously fragile, as though one wrong move from the model and they’d snap like icicles. But Duann Scott, design evangelist from Shapeways, says despite the wings weighing less than a pound, the laser-sintered nylon is actually pretty durable.

“The 3-D printed Nylon used in the outfit is surprisingly strong for how visually delicate the design is,” he explains. “When the models first wear the outfit, they move very carefully but soon realize just how durable the material is and forget they are wearing it at all.”

The entire snowflake outfit was printed as separate, interlocking pieces of varying thickness that come together to form a cohesive garment. The first prototype was printed at .8mm, which resulted in a textile that resembled fine lace. “It barely held together, and the machines had to be specifically calibrated to print at such a thin size,” Rothenberg tells Shapeways. “We tried to push the limits of the machine and go as thin as possible for the corset part, while transitioning to the thicker, more structural parts.”

Shapeways has been bridging tech and fashion worlds for a while now, previously crafting a customized, 3-D printed gown for Dita Von Teese last year, and selling things like 3-D printed bikinis on its site. But this level of optimization and customization—the ability to create a design that's engineered to a specific person's body—is a totally new path for fashion, and one particularly well-suited to a body-conscious brand like Victoria's Secret.

So will we be printing our own underwear and bras in the near future? Maybe not, but Scott seems to think 3-D printing is getting further and further away from its reputation as a nerdy, insider's way to make random kick knacks. "3-D Printing is a perfect technology to incorporate into fashion as the rapid production and versatility of the process perfectly matches the speed of the season-to-season fashion world," he says.

The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show airs tonight at 10 p.m. ET on CBS.