It has been just over a year since Shapeways moved it's headquarters to NYC and it has been an amazing ride so far. The New York office went from one solitary NYC hire (Dan) and three Dutchies (Peter, Robert & Marleen) to a team of twenty one over the course of the year and still growing FAST.

In addition to the NYC office we are gearing up to open our fabrication facility in New York City early in the 2012.   If you want to be part of the Shapeways team we currently have twelve openings in NYC and another four in Eindhoven where the magic started.  Join us to help people make the most awesome stuff. 

Growthobjects have shared the unpacking of their africa #ceramic and lillyseed #02 3D prints from Shapeways. Beautiful.

Need to power on for the morning/weekend/work/whatever? The Power Ring by Designerica 3D printed in stainless steel or silver may just be way to get started.

A cool Kickstarter project that uses Shapeways 3D printing to extend the usability of the Amazon Kindle

The Kapsule Lightstand by Pieco is everything that you need to make your Kindle complete. It's the highest quality reading light available, and it gets its power straight from the Kindle. It has a slide-out kickstand for hands-free reading, and it provides a comfortable ergo-style grip for long reading sessions.

Vienna University of Technology unveiled their prototype for the world's smallest 3D printer in May this year developed by Klaus Stadlmann and Markus Hatzenbichler. Klaus recently presented the micro-printer at TEDx Vienna, on crutches.. 

Shapeways community member and mathematician Henry Segerman was recently interviewed on BBC Radio show Outriders about mathematical shapes and their transference to the physical world as sculpture via 3D printing.  Listen to the interview, check out Henry's site and ponder visualizations of a multi dimension universe. You may remember Henry's Hilbert Curve 3D print (pictured below), and Knotted Kog. Henry is a research fellow at the University of Melbourne doing research in 3-dimensional geometry and topology, particularly involving ideal triangulations.

It is the day of 3D printed skulls at Shapeways

What better gift for the Minecraft addict than a full color 3D Print of their avatar.

Minetoys is an online service that uses Shapeways 3D printing to create a full color 3D model of a Minecraft avatar.

How does it work?  Your Minecraft skin is rendered in HD file (yeah, HD pixels !) and applied to a 3D model, verified by a human being, and then sent to Shapeways for 3D Printing. You can also choose from over 600 Minecraft avatars from the Minetoys Shapeways Shop including Le Boblennon officiel !, xXNuageZombieXx, Manamaxxx and many, many more.

Want to get together and talk all things 3D printing with other Shapeways users in NYC? Join us on Tuesday December 13 at Birch Coffee for coffee/wine and bring your 3D prints, examples of post production or questions about 3D Printing.  Join us upstairs in the Birch Coffee Library at 7pm and be sure to RSVP via Meetup so that we can reserve enough space. We are looking forward to seeing you there.

Where: Birch Coffee, Upstairs, 5 East 27th Street, Manhattan, NY

When:  Tuesday December 13, 2011, 7pm

As the end of the year fast approaches and time seems to accelerate to some kind of holiday induced singularity the chance to order 3D printed gifts for family and friends is closing fast. Visit the Holiday Planning Page for all details but those in Europe and North America have until December 9th to get orders in the remaining materials while those in the rest of the world have unfortunately now missed the deadline of December 4th.  If you have missed the window of opportunity you can still get a Gift Certificate for the prefect last minute gift.  More on that soon.