London’s PrintME 3D Joins Nepal Disaster Relief Efforts and Wants Your Design Ideas!

Article 25 of the Universal Declaration for Human Rights states that:

“Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.”

And now, 3D printing is playing yet another central role in ensuring that this commitment to the health and well-being of all gets realized. This time, the target population is the survivors of two recent devastating earthquakes in Nepal. The earthquakes together have killed more than 8,000 people with 9 out of 10 schools destroyed (over 24,000 classrooms), affecting nearly 1 million children’s ability to attend school.

London-based PrintME 3D, which offers a full range of 3D printing services, has teamed up with the charitable organization named after the human rights article, Article 25, and Scandanavian Business Seating, in order to held rebuild Nepal in the aftermath of this disaster. Article 25 has put out a call for rebuilding ideas in its Nepal Reconstruction Appeal.

It is widely acknowledged that 3D printing’s speedy and cost-effective methods for creating medical and tooling equipment, water filtration, and engineering tools can be central in rebuilding efforts. PrintME 3D concurs with this important 3D printing application, and will be exhibiting ideas for Article 25’s Nepal Reconstruction Appeal at the Clerkenwell Design Week 2015.

PrintME 3D is also calling upon its fellow 3D printing tribe to send ideas and designs that offer innovative and viable desktop 3D printing solutions for Nepal earthquake disaster relief. The size of the designs should be limited to 28 x 19 x 19 cm (unless they are multiple parts that fit within those requirements). The best ideas will be 3D printed by PrintME 3D Studio and published online. Please send across your designs to studio@printme3d.com — for files in excess of 5MB, please send a request for a Dropbox link.

When natural disasters occur, it is difficult to know how to contribute to relief efforts. Here, PrintME 3D offers designers an opportunity to contribute in a direct and viable way by submitting designs for Nepal school reconstruction efforts. According to PrintME 3D, Article 25 has a strong, decade-long history constructing earthquake- resistant schools in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chile, and Haiti:

“They can design schools that will withstand the next earthquake and prevent another disaster. Without urgent technical support and more robust building methods, Nepal will experience similar tragedies in the future.”

It’s time to put your thinking caps on designing 3D printable ideas for Article 25’s Nepal Reconstruction Appeal via PrintME 3D. If you happen to be one of the lucky designers to have your idea adopted and realized, what could be more satisfying?

Let us know how you think 3D printing technology can aid in humanitarian efforts in the Nepal Reconstruction Effort from PrintME 3D and Article 25 forum thread over at 3DPB.com.