diff --git a/aerosandbox/geometry/airplane.py b/aerosandbox/geometry/airplane.py
index 9f2f19de..25573d48 100644
--- a/aerosandbox/geometry/airplane.py
+++ b/aerosandbox/geometry/airplane.py
@@ -799,7 +799,11 @@ def generate_cadquery_geometry(self,
         Returns: A CADQuery Workplane object containing the CAD geometry of the airplane.
 
         """
-        import cadquery as cq
+        try:
+            import cadquery as cq
+        except ModuleNotFoundError:
+            raise ModuleNotFoundError(
+                "The `cadquery` library is required to use this function. Please install it with `pip install cadquery`.")
 
         solids = []
 
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 28ccaf57..1dd82e1f 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -63,7 +63,6 @@
             'pyvista >= 0.31',
             'trimesh >= 3',
             'sympy >= 1',
-            'cadquery >= 2',
             'shapely >= 2',
         ],
         "test": [