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46 DESIGN SEP/OCT 2026 FDM ASIA | www.fdmasia.com

and broader user experience of the proposed system, including a virtual design in the physical world, with the total material
perceived usefulness, user satisfaction, sense of presence, cost estimated within approximately eight percent of the
immersion, and overall interaction quality, remains an important actual ordering cost.
direction for future research. The successful reproduction of the chair demonstrates
Comparative evaluations with existing design and DIY that the system can bridge the gap between virtual design
tools would also help clarify the advantages and limitations and physical fabrication, offering a practical pathway for DIY

of the proposed approach. enthusiasts, design students, and furniture professionals to
Another area for future extension is the development of an translate creative ideas into tangible objects.
automatic assembly procedure generation tool for constructing Several directions for future improvement remain. Reducing
physical furniture. cutting and joining misoperations and improving the fidelity
Based on information about objects designed in the virtual of physical reproduction by recording additional positional
environment, it may be possible to provide users with step- information in the exported blueprint would further enhance
by-step assembly instructions by overlaying 3D models of the usability and practicality.
wooden components onto the actual materials while they work. Adding visual cutting guides, virtual measuring tools, and
Such a system would further bridge the gap between virtual numerical attachment-point data would improve fabrication

design and physical construction, reducing the cognitive load accuracy.
on users during assembly. Extending the system with the Meta Quest's passthrough
capability could let users overlay a virtual object directly onto
Conclusions physical space while refining a design and supporting multiple
This study proposed a VR-DIY system that supports both simultaneous users could enable collaborative DIY between
the process of designing furniture inside VR and the physical geographically distant users.
fabrication of the resulting design. Developing automatic assembly instruction generation

The system implements seven core functions: object would further reduce the gap between virtual design and
generation, object cutting, object joining, save/load, part physical construction.
alignment, PDF blueprint export, and material cost calculation. The findings of this study suggest that VR-based furniture
Using this system, a user can design furniture in VR design with blueprint export has the potential to lower the
without the material loss, injury risk, and trial-and-error costs barriers to physical DIY, reduce material waste, and support
associated with physical DIY, inspect the resulting object more sustainable and accessible furniture making.
part by part, and obtain a blueprint document reporting the The proposed workflow—from virtual design to blueprint to
dimensions and cost of every part. physical assembly—offers a practical pathway for translating
Combined with a wood custom-cut ordering service, this creative ideas into tangible objects, with applications in DIY,

blueprint allows the required materials to be obtained and the design education, industrial prototyping, and collaborative
design reproduced in the real world. design environments.
As a preliminary trial, we fabricated a chair based on a By enabling users to iterate freely in VR before
blueprint generated by the proposed system using a wood committing to physical materials, the system contributes
custom-cut ordering service. to more efficient use of resources and more confident,
This trial provided evidence that the proposed blueprint successful making. FDM
export function provides sufficient information to reproduce ENQUIRY NO. 5301