Greeting Arkio Community,
We, The SRDS Rebels are excited to share on how we use Arkio at our School. I am Giri, an upper school computer science teacher. I Co-teach a class, “The VR City Building“ with the Tech Director of our school, Laura Hollis, using Arkio.
We are particularly excited to write and share this community post because we want to show the impact the Arkio team is making in this schools by supporting them, we want to keep the team motivated by sharing our students work, so that they can keep building Arkio with more great features. We also would like to thank Arkio team for supporting our school, SRDS, NJ, USA.
Our high school students are using Arkio to reimagine urban design through the lens of sustainability and futuristic infrastructure. Working in VR with Meta Quest headsets, they’re creating architectural designs that align with UN Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG 11.3, which focuses on inclusive and sustainable urbanization and participatory urban planning. We envisioned a workflow, where all the students design the city in Arkio and 3D print them, so that they can see something tangible and reinforces their creativity and learning.
With Arkio’s super cool VR interface, students get to see their designs in real life, like they’re building buildings themselves! They can use parametric components and volumetric modeling tools to shape things up.
We’re taking these digital creations into the real world by 3D printing selected student designs. This workflow from conceptualization in VR to tangible physical models demonstrates the complete design-to-fabrication pipeline that professional architects and urban planners use today
Please take a look at the images attached below showcasing our workflow, planning and few examples building we developed in Arkio.
One of the students is very proud to develop the palace you see in the images above, and it was even more rewarding when we 3D printed the palace.
For our next steps with the spatial understanding gained through VR helps them make design decisions that account for both ground-level and aerial traffic patterns, essential considerations for cities preparing for flying cars/vehicle integration.
This approach demonstrates how VR design tools like Arkio can help the next generation of urban planners and architects think critically about creating livable, sustainable cities ready for emerging technologies.
We’re incredibly grateful to the Arkio team for building such an accessible and powerful platform that makes immersive design education possible. Your tool has transformed how our students understand spatial relationships, collaborate on complex projects, and envision the future of urban design. The ability to move seamlessly from VR sketching to detailed modeling, and then to physical 3D prints, has given our students a professional-grade workflow that inspires them to think bigger about solving real-world challenges. Thank you for democratizing architectural design tools and supporting the next generation of designers and urban planners.
Best,
Giridhar Peddi
Computer Science Teacher at SRDS
