3D-printed Moon garden

The adult category of ESA's lunar 3D printing competition was won by Helen Schell from the UK, proposing a ‘magic Moon garden’, printed from recycled coloured plastics.

“What’s missing on the Moon?” wrote Helen. “Colour and living plants. This is an idea for a colourful carpet of interchangeable colour and design, which can be moved and the scale changed wherever you want to site it in your lunar habitat.”

Like real flowers and plants, their 3D printed equivalents would be aromatic, to freshen the air, and perform the work of an air recycling unit changing carbon dioxide to oxygen. They would also ‘grow’ as each plant would be made up of smaller components that could be rearranged or added to over time, as if growing in nature.