Maria Sgîrcea – practices at iMAKE3D

This week, I had the pleasure of spending time with Maria Sgîrcea, a wonderful young woman from Timișoara, who joined us for training and hands-on experience in 3D printing. An architect by trade, Maria is currently gearing up to launch the makerspace FOR.makers in Timișoara. She is also involved in prototyping and product design at the informal lab Lână&Beton, organizes cultural and professional events with the LIGHT EDU team, contributes to creative projects at the FOR studio, and serves as a founding member of FABER Capacitance Building.

Your projects are very promising and we are happy to be able to contribute to some of them, starting by inviting you to our showroom and offering you useful information in the field of 3D printing, but also later when we hope to build a fruitful collaboration.

We wanted to document all the activities that Maria carried out here in our showroom, so having 4 days available we tried to go through all the phases of 3D printing, from the presentation of consumables to the post-processing of a 3D printed part.

At the end of the practice period in the iMAKE3D showroom, Maria shared with us all her experience and knowledge acquired here by filling out a form with questions relating to each activity of the day.

Maria Adela Sgircea

Tell us about yourself. What are you doing

As an architect by profession, I am currently preparing the opening of the makerspace FOR.makers in Timișoara, I deal with prototyping and product design in the informal laboratory Lână&Beton, I organize cultural-professional events in the LIGHT EDU team, I design within the FOR studio and I am a founding member of FABER Capacity Building. I am also an active member of the Architecture Association, an association active in promoting education on the built environment, and I take care of the Ladies, Wine & Design Timișoara chapter. Everything I do, all the projects mentioned above, I do in exceptional teams, small and large.

Maria Sgîrcea – practices at iMAKE3D

When did you first interact with 3D printing and why?

I realised, around 2015, during experiments with the casting molds I needed for the objects I was developing in the Lână&Beton laboratory, that I needed greater prototyping and mold adaptation capacity, ideally also greater speed in switching from one mold to another. The following year, since there was no makerspace in Timișoara where we had access to 3D printing technology and since online 3D printing platforms were still in their infancy, I took the decisive step and, together with my colleague and friend, purchased a 3D printera desktop “additive manufacturing equipment” with FDM technology.

We immediately understood how we could develop the products in the workshop. We have since launched a collection that would not have existed without the influence of the 3D printer.

Furthermore, we have introduced the printer to everything we do, from modifications, adaptations and repairs, at home, to architectural models and research, in the profession. We regret nothing! Furthermore, once the makerspace is open, we will share what we know, both with those who are curious and with those who do not yet know the potential of these technologies.

Why you chose the Formlabs Form2 printer to print in 3D

I have been interested in SLS technology for a long time but have not had the opportunity to delve deeply into it and fully understand its potential. The level of finish and resolution are obviously what piqued my curiosity. What I learned along the way is that it is possible to print on different materials with different properties and therefore different purposes. I find the Castable material extremely interesting, which is used for molds used mainly in the jewelery sector, but not only. I understand that this is a material that leaves no residue after serving its purpose of forming a casting mold for various metals