By Spooky on May 30th, 2025 Category: Architecture
Towering above the rooftops of Mulegns, a picturesque village in the Swiss Alps, the recently unveiled Tor Alva (White Tower) is the world’s tallest 3D-printed building.
Mulegns, a tiny village of only 12 permanent residents nestled at the foot of the Swiss Alps, hardly seems like the perfect place to install the world’s tallest 3D-printed building, but local authorities decided that the unique installation could help revitalize the slowly fading community. Tor Alva stands 30 meters high and has a modular design featuring a total of 32 individually printed columns connected by giant screws and steel cables rather than glued with cement. No steel frame was used when printing the tower’s pieces, but its creators claim that the technological innovations showcased by the tower make it both extremely safe and easy to dismantle and move, if necessary.
“Technical innovations include the structural use of 3D-printed concrete with thin-walled, material-efficient components, as well as modular construction for future reuse,” Tor Alva’s official page reads. “Among the pioneering contributions of Tor Alva are novel structural solutions to reinforce the 3D-printed concrete, one of the main challenges in the field up to now. The innovations in these research fields will fundamentally change construction, paving the way for more sustainable building practices.”
Tor Alva was unveiled on May 20, 2025, in front of a crowd of about 300 excited people who were then able to climb the 3D-printed stairs of the tower all the way to the top floor, which acts as a domed theather for various artistic performances, but also as a platform for taking in the breathtaking alpine scenery.
The world’s tallest 3D-printed tower was built by architects and a research team from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich to showcase the groundbreaking advancements in computational design, digital fabrication, structural engineering, and material science, which the team believes will change 3D printing standards for the better.
“Technical innovations include the structural use of 3D-printed concrete with thin-walled, material-efficient components, as well as modular construction for future reuse,” Tor Alva’s official page reads. “Among the pioneering contributions of Tor Alva are novel structural solutions to reinforce the 3D-printed concrete, one of the main challenges in the field up to now. The innovations in these research fields will fundamentally change construction, paving the way for more sustainable building practices.”
Tor Alva was unveiled on May 20, 2025, in front of a crowd of about 300 excited people who were then able to climb the 3D-printed stairs of the tower all the way to the top floor, which acts as a domed theather for various artistic performances, but also as a platform for taking in the breathtaking alpine scenery.
The world’s tallest 3D-printed tower was built by architects and a research team from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich to showcase the groundbreaking advancements in computational design, digital fabrication, structural engineering, and material science, which the team believes will change 3D printing standards for the better.
