Filament comes in every color, just like flowers. Why not create some beautiful 3D-printed flowers that will bloom forever?
With spring coming, it’s the perfect time to print some flowers and liven up your home. These ones will stay alive and colorful no matter where you live, no matter the weather. Even better, flowers are a great kind of print to experiment with resolutions, printing settings, materials, and colors.
We’ve gathered some of the most interesting flower prints to try out for yourself. Some are impressive replicas of the real thing, while others have a more artistic or functional take on flowers.
If you want to bring some floral touches to your decor but don’t have access to a 3D printer, try Craftcloud by All3DP. With countless colors and materials available, your flowers will be sent to your door without you even having to brave the pollen outside!
Droolop
Stringing is usually something that we aim to avoid when printing, but the creator of the droolop flowers used it to their advantage by increasing and controlling it. The flower petals are purposefully printed into thin air with no supports, and reattached right back down into the center of the flower, resulting in some very unique flowers.
You can experiment with different lengths of loops and flower centers, resulting in infinite possibilities, and with huge potential for you to put your own spin on the flowers!
- Who designed it? peetersm
- How printable/popular is it? 65 people have printed these, but you’ll need to carefully follow the slicing instructions to achieve the beautiful effects.
- Where to find it? YouMagine, Thingiverse
Realistic Rose
This is a simple but elegant design to be sure. It’s a realistic model of a rose in full bloom, and is a golden opportunity to perfect your printing settings, try out different colors, materials, and surface finishes or, if you’re feeling brave, even try printing with a dual-extruder to obtain a multicolored flower.
This dainty rose needs supports, but it’s recommended that they be very thin and low density, as the final product is quite thin and needs a delicate hand. The higher the printing resolution, the better results you’ll get.
- Who designed it? euroreprapEU
- How printable/popular is it? 31 people have shared Makes of this rose, including some hand-painted prints that look even more realistic!
- Where to find it? Thingiverse
Hummingbird Automaton
3D printing has opened the door to many more possibilities of creation, and automatons are certainly one of the most popular and impressive-looking choices around. This hummingbird automaton moves its wings and swings back and forth while it samples a sweet flower.
It was designed by Greg Zumwalt, who has designed a whole series of incredible automatons if you’re interested in printing more (including a double hummingbird). Keep in mind your printer’s tolerance because all geared parts need to fit perfectly for it to move without issue.
- Who designed it? gzumwalt
- How printable/popular is it? 6 people have shared photos of their builds on Instructables, so it’s definitely achievable, if a little more complex than the other prints on this list.
- Where to find it? MyMiniFactory, Instructables
Hummingbird Feeder
Since we’re on the subject of hummingbirds, this flower-related print will help you attract some real ones. It’s fairly easy to print with only two parts, one of which is a flower you print three times. You’ll also need an empty water bottle to fill up with sugar water to feed the little fellas (one part sugar to four parts water).
This is a great print you can have in your garden to attract more color and life to it. Just make sure your print is as water-resistant as possible.
- Who designed it? Gazorpa
- How printable/popular is it? This model has 24 Makes and it’s pretty easy to put together; no supports are required during printing.
- Where to find it? Thingiverse
Blooming Lamp
Now for a more challenging print that combines form and functionality. On the one hand, it blooms, which is a step up from most 3D printed flowers. But even better, it’s also a lamp. So, you get to do a simple but fun electronic project, which gives your room an ambient light and looks incredible.
In addition to the printed parts, you’ll need an Arduino and some nuts and bolts. Watch them bloom in the video below!
- Who designed it? Puzzlebox
- How printable/popular is it? This popular model has been downloaded 13,500 times from YouMagine, and there are 2 Makes on Thingiverse.
- Where to find it? Puzzlebox, YouMagine, Thingiverse
Flat Daisy
Yes, you’re seeing that right. These are fake flowers, not real ones. The design is fairly simple but detailed enough and it opens itself up (like a flower blooming) to many possibilities. You can paint it with as many details as you want, print in different colors, and create a realistic-looking bouquet of 3D prints!
All parts are printed separately and glued together to form a strikingly realistic flower.
- Who designed it? Mag-net
- How printable/popular is it? This model has around 13,000 downloads across YouMagine and Thingiverse. You need to print some parts more than once but everything is clearly explained by the author.
- Where to find it? YouMagine, Thingiverse
Tealight Holder
When it comes to candle holders, flower shapes are a classic, and thanks to 3D printing it’s a model that you can make at home. This pretty tealight holder is flower-shaped, and you can print as many as you need to create one for every room!
It needs supports, so be sure to use a setting that’s not too dense or too close to the shell so that you don’t impact the surface quality when removing them. The creator also recommends infill as low as 10%.
- Who designed it? jaredlr
- How printable/popular is it? The model has 1 community print, repurposed as a cactus holder, and over 800 downloads.
- Where to find it? MyMiniFactory
Life-Size Lego
This design might feel familiar, as it’s the classic Lego flowers but scaled up so large as to be almost unrecognizable. Lego flowers are nostalgic, retro, and have a great color palette.
This would make a great decoration for a kid’s (or grown-up’s) toy room. Without scaling, the model prints to around 5 inches tall, but the designer notes that you can scale it to whatever size you fancy. The flowers print separately from the stems so the colors are totally customizable, and you’ll just need some supports on the base.
- Who designed it? tomvdb
- How printable/popular is it? The beautiful Lego flowers have one community print in addition to the designer’s own creation.
- Where to find it? MyMiniFactory
Twist Box
Print-in-place models are prints with moving components that are printed in a single piece. This method of printing is usually used for designs that need to ensure a smooth motion and therefore benefit from not having union lines.
In this case, it’s a closed flower bud with a gear at the base. By turning the gear, the flower blooms revealing the contents inside. The perfect box for a small gift, or even an engagement ring!
- Who designed it? FragrantAbyss
- How printable/popular is it? The model has 2 Makes, and it’s printed in place so you don’t need to assemble anything. A color-changing filament was used to create the impressive dual-color print pictured above.
- Where to find it? Thingiverse
Maz’s Flower
With all the incredibly realistic 3D printed flowers out there, you could print a whole bouquet! Let’s add this one to the mix. In this case, the print is composed of two parts, the leaves and the bud, and a stick can be used for the stem for an extra dose of realism.
The bud is printed in one piece, but if you’re the adventurous kind you could even attempt to change filament mid-print to add a second color on the top petal tips.
The same designers also have a beautiful dahlia to print!
- Who designed it? MazAndAttero
- How printable/popular is it? 21 prints have been shared of this model. You print the flower and the leaves, and will need a stick or skewer to attach them to.
- Where to find it? Thingiverse
Super Mario
Next up, we have some Mario-related flowers for videogame aficionados. On the one hand, there’s the Fire Flowers, with the question block included. But if you print it in blue it can also be an Ice Flower, which is the best power-up out of the two. What’s best, you can open up the question block to store Switch game cards.
If that looks like too much work, take it back to 8-bit with these retro fire flowers from Super Mario World for SNES.
- Who designed it? Dsk001
- How printable/popular is it? There are 3 Makes of this Switch card holder flower, and 47 Makes of the retro version!
- Where to find it? Thingiverse
Pen Holder
Now for something that’s less decorative and more useful, but equally iconic, a flower shaped pencil holder. It’s elegance, it’s innovation, it’s not losing your pens after one use.
This print is composed of the flowers, the stem, and the base, and none of the parts need support as long as you orient them correctly on the printing bed. Why not keep one at work to be the envy of your colleagues?
- Who designed it? Matt-G
- How printable/popular is it? This model was only updated in 2022 but has already been added to three collections.
- Where to find it? PrusaPrinters
Source: 3D Printed Flowers: The Beautiful Models to 3D Print | All3DP