3D printing enables Camper to explore new shoe design possibilities
Spanish footwear brand Camper, recognized for its stylish yet casual and comfy shoes for men and women, has found its own way to benefit from 3D printing technologies. At its headquarters in Inca, on the island of Mallorca, Camper has installed a number of desktop 3D printers from Barcelona’s BCN3D Technologies, which are helping to streamline its shoe design process.
Camper’s design team works on a fairly tight schedule, with each collection’s concept and shoe designs needing to be complete within three months. Before the implementation of 3D printing at its headquarters, Camper relied on external prototyping services to produce design models. This process, which would take a couple of weeks per shoe iteration, meant that design changes were limited and most of the design work was done digitally.
Since installing a range of Sigma and Sigmax 3D printers, however, the well known shoe brand has drastically sped up its iteration times for shoe designs. Shoe prototypes can be turned out in-house in as quickly as 24 hours, allowing Camper designers and engineers to explore various new design possibilities.
“Working with BCN3D printers is very useful because if we have an idea in mind, together with a technician, we can obtain quick and direct results for the dimensions of components,” said Job Willemsen, Senior Designer at Camper. “This enhances our ability to be reactive.”
In short, the adoption of 3D printing is allowing the footwear company to produce design models in a much shorter timeframe and at much lower costs than before. This frees up significant time for designers to come up with new and creative design concepts, while still ensuring the shoe meets Camper’s functional and comfort standards.
In addition to wanting to work with a local company, Camper reportedly chose BCN3D’s printers because of their dual extrusion capabilities and their precision. As Jordi Guirado, Product Engineer at Camper, explained: “Because of the dual-extruder system, we can use water-soluble print material. As a result, we can work with more complex geometric shapes and reduce design time for the whole collection.”
