To say that 3D-printing is currently a wild area would be an understatement. Few technological topics outside biotech have been so present in public life recently, resulting in every (im)possible promise[1], practical solutions to household problems[2] and even political discourse[3]. Yet although 3D-printing used as a production method (AM) has quickly claimed some noteworthy niches such as hearing aids and top-end turbines, it has on the whole failed to deliver the promised revolution in our daily lives.

On one hand this is due to the shifting nature of a developing technology meeting reality, but on the other the failure to understand this new set of tools as unique and essentially different from those from the past has stalled many possible implementations already at reach with current technologies. Space X didn’t reinvent rockets yet through a better understanding of decades-old technology and a creative iterative approach, space exploration has expanded in few years more than in the decades after the moon landing. We are certainly missing available opportunities with AM as well.

The AICE model provides a holistic method which facilitates moving between conception, design, development and testing, which should lead to successful production and delivery when using AM. Its retro-feeding, iterative approach is certainly a very useful framework when using AM in an integrated manner with designers, engineers and customers. Nevertheless, the method does not yet provide concrete and practical guidelines to finding the right AM track for a specific project or idea, since the AM Matrix is very complex, discontinuous, full of unexpected dead-ends and continuously evolving.

This research project seeks to further develop the AICE method by exploring AM’s different parameters, with the aim of creating a practical guideline for designers when faced with a new project involving this set of technologies. The goal is certainly not to create a theory of everything in the field but rather to better define the criteria to be used as no-goes or green lights for different solutions, as well as providing a more systematic set of questions and guidelines which should lead to a suitable AM track as early as possible in the project. Painful dead-ends are thus to be avoided en route to AM’s vague and somewhat elusive sweet spot.