Dendrite Lace Earrings — Every Seed Grows a Different One

A lace disc grown rather than drawn. Points sit on concentric rings inside the disc, each links to a randomly-chosen neighbour on the ring inside it, and the web is extruded flat into an earring. Change the seed in the source and you get a pattern nobody else has — not one earring, a generator for them.

Two structures, both included

• Graph — random chords close the cells, stiffer, reads like crazed glaze

• Tree — outer tips hang free, airier, reads like coral or lichen

Print the same file twice for a matched pair, or one of each for a mismatched pair. No left and right; the disc is symmetric.

Specification

• 27.0 x 30.6 x 1.8 mm, 0.84 g graph / 0.67 g tree

• Flat on the bed, no overhangs, no supports, about 20 min per disc

• Bail bore 2.6 mm, sized so a 4 mm jump ring clears the bar diagonal

• Needs two 4 mm jump rings and two ear wires per pair

• Hangs straight on any seed — cant across 16 seeds measured 0.0 to 0.3 degrees

Printing

0.2 mm layers, 3 walls, 100% infill. Expect stringing — nine layers of disconnected islands means the nozzle crosses open air constantly. Dry the filament first (silk and translucent PLA are the worst, and this is usually the whole fix), then run 5 to 10 C cooler and lengthen retraction. What survives comes off with a heat gun waved past.

Parametric source included. ASSEMBLY.txt in the download has the full walkthrough.