What is vase mode and how do I enable it?
It is a slicer mode that prints the outer contour of the piece as one continuous spiral, rising without ever interrupting the extrusion: no vertical seam, no infill, and a very fast print. In Cura it is called Spiralize Outer Contour, and in PrusaSlicer and Bambu Studio, Spiral vase. The condition for it to work is that the model must be a SOLID with a single continuous outer wall, which is exactly what the dedicated output in the ilove3d vase generator produces. If you handed the slicer an already-hollow vase, spiral mode would get confused by the inner wall and the result would be unpredictable. The other output, with a wall, is meant for the opposite case: printing with normal perimeters and infill, which is what you need if the vase is going to hold anything. Choosing the wrong output is the single most common reason a spiral print comes out wrong, so it is worth checking before slicing rather than afterwards.
Does the printed vase hold water?
In spiral mode the wall is a single extrusion line, and however well calibrated your printer is, that kind of part tends to seep over time: there is always some microscopic gap between layers. There are three routes. The simplest is using the walled output from the ilove3d vase generator at 2 mm or more and printing with three or more perimeters, which gives a real wall that holds. The second is printing in spiral mode but in PETG with a 0.6 mm nozzle, which bonds between layers far better than PLA does. The third, and the one most people take, is not fighting it at all: drop a glass jar or a cut bottle inside and use the printed vase as a decorative sleeve, which also lets you change the water without touching the piece.
Which filament looks best?
Silk filaments, multicolour ones and translucent ones look best, and that is no coincidence: the twisted lobes the vase generates create curved surfaces that catch light at different angles, and that shifting sheen along the piece is exactly what a silk filament exaggerates. As a side effect they hide layer lines far better than a matte colour. Multicolour filaments with a long transition work especially well on tall pieces, because the gradient runs across the whole vase. And one recommendation that changes the result more than colour does: printing spiral mode with a 0.6 mm nozzle rather than 0.4 leaves a coarse line texture that comes remarkably close to hand-thrown ceramic. It is worth printing the same vase twice in different filaments: it is the cheapest way to see how much the result changes without touching the geometry at all.
Can I print it without supports?
Yes, always, and that is a property of how the geometry is built rather than a coincidence. The vase grows from the base upward as a continuous surface of revolution, with no abrupt overhangs and no parts starting in mid-air, so every layer rests on the one below. The only case that can cause trouble is exaggerating the belly while closing the neck tightly: the wall then leans over and the angle from vertical can pass 45 degrees, which is where most printers start needing help. The ilove3d vase generator shows the silhouette live, so it is immediately visible. The fix is reducing the lobe depth or raising the neck position, and that brings it back into printable range. The preview updates as you drag, so finding the limit is a matter of watching the silhouette rather than calculating anything by hand beforehand.
How big can I make it?
Up to 260 mm tall and 200 mm at the belly, although the real limit is always your printer build volume rather than the tool. What surprises many people is that large sizes in spiral mode print considerably faster than you would expect: because the nozzle never leaves the part and makes no travel moves, and there is no infill to fill, a 250 mm vase can come off the bed in a few hours. Height is the parameter worth raising if you are unsure, because on a body of revolution slenderness is what changes the character most. The ilove3d vase generator shows the dimensions in millimetres beside the preview, so you can check them against your bed before exporting anything. If your printer is small, lower the height before narrowing the belly: a short wide vase reads worse than a slender one of the same volume.
How does 'describe it in words' work?
You write what you want in plain language — tall and slender, Greek amphora style, for instance — and a language model translates that sentence into the actual parameters: height, base, belly and neck diameters, lobe count and twist. You can then keep adjusting everything by hand, because the suggestion fills the controls rather than replacing them. What matters is what travels and what does not: only your text and the current configuration are sent to the AI, the latter so that asking make it taller works, and never a file. The 3D model is generated entirely in your browser, as everything else on ilove3d is. The values it returns are also clamped on the client side, because a language model can perfectly well propose numbers outside the valid range. And when the suggestion misses, it still works as a starting point: it usually lands closer than beginning from the default values would.