Forget shopping. Soon you'll download your new clothes

Downloadable, printable clothing may be coming to a closet near you. What started as designer Danit Peleg's fashion school project turned into a collection of 3D-printed designs that have the strength and flexibility for everyday wear. "Fashion is a very physical thing," she says. "I wonder how our world will look like when our clothes will be digital."

In the past few months, I've been
traveling for weeks at a time

with only one suitcase of clothes.

One day, I was invited
to an important event,

and I wanted to wear
something special and new for it.

So I looked through my suitcase
and I couldn't find anything to wear.

I was lucky to be at the technology
conference on that day,

and I had access to 3D printers.

So I quickly designed
a skirt on my computer,

and I loaded the file on the printer.

It just printed the pieces overnight.

The next morning,
I just took all the pieces,

assembled them together in my hotel room,

and this is actually the skirt
that I'm wearing right now.

(Applause)

So it wasn't the first time
that I printed clothes.

For my senior collection
at fashion design school,

I decided to try and 3D print
an entire fashion collection from my home.

The problem was that I barely knew
anything about 3D printing,

and I had only nine months to figure out
how to print five fashionable looks.

I always felt most creative
when I worked from home.

I loved experimenting with new materials,

and I always tried
to develop new techniques

to make the most unique textiles
for my fashion projects.

I loved going to old factories
and weird stores

in search of leftovers
of strange powders and weird materials,

and then bring them home to experiment on.

As you can probably imagine,

my roommates didn't like that at all.

(Laughter)

So I decided to move on
to working with big machines,

ones that didn't fit in my living room.

I love the exact
and the custom work I can do

with all kinds of fashion technologies,

like knitting machines
and laser cutting and silk printing.

One summer break, I came here
to New York for an internship

at a fashion house in Chinatown.

We worked on two incredible dresses
that were 3D printed.

They were amazing --
like you can see here.

But I had a few issues with them.

They were made from hard plastics
and that's why they were very breakable.

The models couldn't sit in them,

and they even got scratched
from the plastics under their arms.

With 3D printing, the designers
had so much freedom

to make the dresses look
exactly like they wanted,

but still, they were very dependent
on big and expensive industrial printers

that were located in a lab
far from their studio.

Later that year, a friend gave me
a 3D printed necklace,

printed using a home printer.

I knew that these printers
were much cheaper

and much more accessible
than the ones we used at my internship.

So I looked at the necklace,

and then I thought, "If I can
print a necklace from home,

why not print my clothes from home, too?"

I really liked the idea that I wouldn't
have to go to the market

and pick fabrics that
someone else chose to sell --

I could just design them
and print them directly from home.

I found a small Makerspace,

where I learned everything
I know about 3D printing.

Right away, they literally
gave me the key to the lab,

so I could experiment
into the night, every night.

The main challenge was to find the right
filament for printing clothes with.

So what is a filament?

Filament is the material
you feed the printer with.

And I spent a month or so
experimenting with PLA,

which is a hard and scratchy,
breakable material.

The breakthrough came
when I was introduced to Filaflex,

which is a new kind of filament.

It's strong, yet very flexible.

And with it, I was able to print
the first garment,

the red jacket that had
the word "Liberté" --

"freedom" in French --

embedded into it.

I chose this word because I felt
so empowered and free

when I could just design
a garment from my home

and then print it by myself.

And actually, you can easily
download this jacket,

and easily change the word
to something else.

For example, your name
or your sweetheart's name.

(Laughter)

So the printer plates are small,

so I had to piece all of the garment
together, just like a puzzle.

And I wanted to solve another challenge.

I wanted to print textiles

that I would use
just like regular fabrics.

That's when I found an open-source file

from an architect who designed
a pattern that I love.

And with it, I was able to print
a beautiful textile

that I would use
just like a regular fabric.

And it actually even looks
a little bit like lace.

So I took his file and I modified it,
and changed it, played with it --

many kinds of versions out of it.

And I needed to print
another 1500 more hours

to complete printing my collection.

So I brought six printers to my home
and just printed 24-7.

And this is actually
a really slow process,

but let's remember the Internet
was significantly slower 20 years ago,

so 3D printing will also accelerate

and in no time you'll be able to print
a T-Shirt in your home

in just a couple of hours,
or even minutes.

So you guys, you want to see
what it looks like?

Audience: Yeah!

(Applause)

Danit Peleg: Rebecca is wearing
one of my five outfits.

Almost everything here she's wearing,
I printed from my home.

Even her shoes are printed.

Audience: Wow!

Audience: Cool!

(Applause)

Danit Peleg: Thank you, Rebecca.

(To audience) Thank you, guys.

So I think in the future,
materials will evolve,

and they will look and feel
like fabrics we know today,

like cotton or silk.

Imagine personalized clothes
that fit exactly to your measurements.

Music was once a very physical thing.

You would have to go
to the record shop and buy CDs,

but now you can just download the music --

digital music --

directly to your phone.

Fashion is also a very physical thing.

And I wonder what our world will look like

when our clothes will be digital,
just like this skirt is.

Thank you so much.

(Applause)

[Thank You]

(Applause)