Machines are in some ways like people, they have personalities, traits, and quirks. Some days they can be your best friend and other days they are frustrating. I think that composes the relationship we all had with Daedalus, our self-built open-source concrete printer. More often than not, printing became a performance with the machine rather than fabrication by the machine. Moving with the gantry, hearing the belts and motors whirl, listening to the concrete extrude, one had to anticipate when it desired more material or required adjustments in printing speed. It was not an exact science; it was a live experiment with constantly changing variables and movements that produced Daedalus’ poetic personality.

— Christopher Battaglia [Concrete Team Member, M.Arch ‘16 at Cornell AAP, Former Research Associate at Cornell RCL]