SchenkelShultz Architecture and employees have created over 300 medical shields for local healthcare workers.
Orlando-based firm SchenkelShultz Architecture and employees are using 3D printers to make medical shields for local healthcare workers. The firm has created 318 shields completed to date and counting.
Michelle Chandler, partner at SchenkelShultz explains, “SchenkelShultz’s vision is to ‘inspire our community through impactful design.’ As architects, we feel a strong social responsibility to create meaningful designs.
In this case, we saw an opportunity to leverage our resources and talent to design a product that could positively impact the lives of healthcare workers in our community.
Michelle Chandler, Partner at SchenkelShultz
The effort is being led by the company’s Associate Principal and Design Lead, Ekta Desai. “I was inspired by a colleague of mine from NYC who shared that he was 3D printing to support the shortages at Weill Cornell Medical Center,” said Ekta. “I expressed that we would like to get ahead of the virus threat for our region.”
Her NYC colleague shared the print file for the medical shields and the team modified it slightly to optimize the number of frames per print on the company’s printer bed. They then began soliciting help from people within the company who also had 3D printers at home to scale the effort.
We intend on making as many shields as possible while the City is in a ‘safe shelter’ state.
Ekta Desai, Associate Principal and Design Lead at SchenkelShultz
Currently, the company has two employees involved and engages in printing all day at the office, completing 25-40 per day. The internal team meets up two or three times each week to exchange frames and filament. Project Designer Art Cotto supports the effort with his at-home 3D printer, which can print three times the amount of the office printer. The shields are distributed to those in need from the office in batches.
“This was a great team effort that would not have succeeded without Art Cotto,” said Ekta. “His work and printer are the critical muscle in the printing of the frames for the shields, and we would not have been able to able to achieve this level of production without him.”
Clancy & Theys Construction Company, a partner of SchenkelShultz’s, has financially supported the purchase of materials for the effort, including the transparency paper and PLA filament needed for printing. The company has also collaborated with Lake Highland, a local High School preparatory school, for volunteers to assemble the shields.
SchenkelShultz is open to working with other collaborators. If you would like to join their effort, contact the company here. Their biggest need is 3D printing support.
SchenkelShultz is actively donating all of the face shields to local healthcare providers.
Some recipients of the masks include:
- Advent Health Medical Group
- Advent Health Winter Park
- Health Central
- Advent Health Daytona
- Jupiter Periodontics
- Orlando Health Cardiology Group
- Orlando Health Medical Group
- Florida Cancer Specialists
- Westminster Communities
