Course Content
13 Lessons
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This workshop merges architecture and fashion through AI, generative design, and 3D printing with Grasshopper.
2 courses5.0
In this hands-on workshop, we’ll explore how generative AI and digital fabrication are reshaping the future of fashion. You’ll uncover essential workflows and gain insights into the creative and technical processes behind Gareth's couture pieces, including pieces crafted from reaction-diffusion algorithms, precision-cut Aluminium metal, fluid 3D-printed gowns inspired by water, and modular assemblies that arise from customized GCode.
This workshop is your pathway to breaking into the fashion industry, including behind-the-scenes stories, preparing for runway showcases like the London Fashion Week, and turning experimental design into a sustainable career path.
By the end of this workshop, you will design your own wearable piece using computational design techniques. We’ll also print your work live during the class.
Computational Design in Grasshopper: Explore Python-based algorithms such as Reaction-diffusion and other generative strategies.
3D Printing and Customized GCode: Tricks on Slicer Settings and customized GCode generation for perfect 3D prints.
AI Integration for Fashion and Textile Design: Utilize image generators for pattern making.
Fashion Industry 101: Discover runway and exhibition opportunities in fashion, such as celeb collaborations and London Fashion Week.
Fashion Business 101: Various ways to promote and monetize your designs.
Complete a Fashion Accessory Prototype: 3D print student work live in class.
This workshop explores how digital workflows can bridge the conceptual world of architecture with the expressive, material-focused domain of fashion. Over two days, the course takes a deep dive into the fusion of computational design, artificial intelligence, and digital fabrication to develop wearable structures that move beyond traditional fashion norms.
We begin by looking at how reaction-diffusion systems, patterns found in nature, can be used as design tools. Starting in Grasshopper, we’ll simulate these organic patterns using pre-written Python scripts that students can modify without prior coding experience.
These simulations act as the digital DNA of the Metal Dress, a wearable prototype born from algorithmic growth and realized through digital fabrication techniques.
The digital workflow continues with a look into the practicalities of production. Students are introduced to fabrication methods for both metal and 3D-printed textiles, learning about material constraints, equipment settings, and post-processing techniques.
On Day 2, the focus shifts to the 3D-Printed Dress, a modular, rippling structure built using fractals and custom G-code.
Students will see how customized toolpaths can be used to break open the traditional 3D printing pipeline and expose creative opportunities often overlooked.
We then pivot to artificial intelligence tools like Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, using them to generate conceptual imagery. These AI-generated visuals are not just mood boards, they become design data.
This workshop will teach you how to extract vector geometries from AI outputs, transforming them into NURBS-based structures ready for fabrication.
Students are encouraged to experiment, remix, and question each stage of the process. Whether producing intricate wearable sculptures or rethinking how AI can shape material aesthetics, the workshop invites participants to challenge the limits of what fashion can be when architecture, algorithms, and fabrication collide.
What you should already know or have ready before you start, experience, tools, and any baseline skills the instructors expect. Scan the list below so nothing catches you off guard.
Course Content
Gareth Volka is a London-based architect and fashion designer. His eponymous couture brand explores the intersection of fashion, computation, digital fabrication, materiality, and sustainability, drawing on years of research into topics such as generative algorithms, free-form 3D printing, programmable matter, biomimetic robotics, and biomaterials. His designs often build narratives around nature and sensuality, brought to life through ingenuity and craftsmanship.
Really great workshop, thanks Gareth!
thanks
I really enjoyed this class. It was great to get a glimpse into Gareth’s practice and learn more about his process.