Makerbot grows, takes entire floor of Brooklyn highrise

makerbot location

How fast is home 3D printing taking off? Just take a look at the company that is the king of home 3D printers, Makerbot Industries, and you’ll see. The company behind the popular Replicator 3D printer is growing so fast that they have out outgrown their current Boerum Hill, Brooklyn digs and have a signed new lease for a new 31,000 sf office in Brooklyn. That’s the entire 21st floor of One Metrotech, a massive pink-and-gray tower also occupied by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley. With a head count of already 125 employees, it likely won’t be long until they’ll need more space.

Makerbot has the distinction of actually being the first tech company to move into downtown Brooklyn. While the area has been designated as a leg of Brooklyn’s burgeoning tech triangle, it is still dominated by financial services companies. The Makerbot move will help move other synergistic companies to the area.

The Wall Street Journal provides more color on their move:

As MakerBot’s popularity took off, the company eventually moved into 87 Third Ave. in Boerum Hill in early 2011.

Whenever they needed more space, Mr. Pettis would knock on doors around the neighborhood to see what else he could find, which resulted in a hodgepodge of several different spaces.

But now the company plans to hire yet another 50 people and its current office-space situation looked increasingly untenable. Mr. Pettis said the new space appealed to the company because of its transportation, views of the bridges and proximity to Five Guys and Shake Shack eateries that have opened nearby.

Makerbot blogger Andrew chimed in on the move in the Maketbot blog:

31,000 square feet! Do you know how many MakerBots we can put in there?! I’m just spitballing here, but I’d guess, like, a million.

As anyone who owns a Replicator knows, we’re a proud Brooklyn company — I say that because with The Replicator, we started lasercutting the word Brooklyn into every machine we produce. We’re super proud to make our products here.

This move to Metro Tech in a couple of months really cements that. We’ll be a member company of the Brooklyn Tech Triangle – that’s Downtown, DUMBO, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and we’ll be joining other awesome tech companies and institutions like NYU’s planned Center for Urban Science and Progress.

Important! We will still be lovingly assembling MakerBots in the BotCave on 3rd Avenue! The machine that will ultimately live on your desk or work table will still be put together and tested inside these handsomely rugged spaces that have become sort of famous. Here’s are some shots of the BotCave through the years.

I was having lunch the other day with someone who contacted me through this blog, so I could tell him more about 3D printing. When I told him that New York City was becoming a major hub for 3D printing, and in fact, a manufacturing center for 3D printers, he just couldn’t believe it. Brooklyn, NY, high tech manufacturing center. Home of the future Apple? Who’d a thunk it?

  • don keller

    dear mark, I have been looking for investment opportunities and am intrigued by 3 d printing.. I read your post about how excited you were about getting a 31,000 sq ft site , and was appalled at your , like 1 million printers in there estimate. I wonder how you could actually get this far, and have no clue about math.. Please check with someone in your co. that knows how to multipty and check my numbers.. if you allowed only 50 % of floor space for humans to transverse in there, and stacked one foot cube printers floor to ceiling, you would at best get 100 thousand of them in there.. please take my advice and calm down. Get your numbers right and somone might actually invest in your co.

    • https://3dprinter.net mark

      Uh, Don…you should read the article again more carefully. I didn’t say that, it was a quote from someone at Makerbot. It’s not my company.

      And I don’t think Andrew, who said that, was really serious about it. Lighten up.

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  • hiyomijo

    Zing!