As Prada Pairs With NASA, a Look at the Best Space-Inspired Looks From the Runway

Editor’s Note: This story has been amended from an earlier iteration published at the time of the 2024 total solar eclipse.

“We choose to go to the Moon,” said President John F. Kennedy in 1962, and we haven’t stopped opting in since America’s first lunar landing. Now Prada is headed there via a collaborative project with NASA.

Designers’ fascination )or should that be fashination?) with the great beyond dates to the mid-’60s when Pierre Cardin, André Courrèges, and Paco Rabanne, created out-of-this-world get-ups for starry-eyed earthlings. Their silver-and-white Space Age aesthetic set the template for futurism in fashion. White, as the BBC reports, actually has functionality for astronauts; it reflects radiation and allows for “visibility even in the darkness of Earth’s shadow.”

The looks assembled here, almost all from runways, are not intended to be hidden, but to make the wearer as memorable as a blazing comet. There are voluminous moon-walker puffers, to be sure, but also body-con and aerodynamic one-pieces, and flowing robes worth of Princess Leia, plus Dune-style draping and not-to-be-missed fluorescence. Technology is represented in the form of computer-chip prints and embroideries, and the sun, moon, stars, and planets are in constant rotation pattern-wise. Designers including Nicolas Ghesquière, Alexander McQueen, and Iris van Herpen, have made many repeat journeys of imagination into the new, blue frontier, and returned with suggestions for our well-dressed future selves. Feel free to explore.

Jennifer Turcios contributed additional image research for this story.

Anrealage, fall 2022 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Anrealage

Balenciaga, fall 2021 ready-to-wear

Phoot: Courtesy of Balenciaga

Balenciaga, fall 2021 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Balenciaga

Kiara Kabukuru, right, in a 3-D print developed by Stephen Sprouse from imagery provided by NASA, for fall 1999.

Photo: Thomas Iannaccone for WWD / Getty Images

Stephen Sprouse, fall 1999 ready-to-wear

Photo: Thomas Iannaccone for WWD / Getty Images

Moncler 5 Craig Green, fall 2018 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Moncler 5 Craig Green

Moncler 5 Craig Green, fall 2018 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Moncler 5 Craig Green

Jil Sander, fall 2023 ready-to-wear

Photo: Alessandro Lucioni / Gorunway.com

Chanel, fall 2017 ready-to-wear

Photo: Kim WestonArnold / Indigi

Chanel, fall 2017 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital

Balmain, fall 2021 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Balmain

Chalayan, fall 2017 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Alexander McQueen, fall 2003 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Féraud, spring 2002 couture

Photo: Antoine de Parseval / Shoot Digital for Style.com

threeASFOUR, fall 2023 couture

Photo: Courtesy of Threeasfour

Chalayan, fall 2007 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Undercover, spring 2019 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Undercover

Noir Kei Ninomiya, fall 2022 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Noir Kei Ninomiya

Givenchy, fall 1999 ready-to-wear

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Jane Fonda in a Paco Rabanne-designed costume for Barbarella, 1966.

Photo: Bettmann

Balenciaga f07 get hres

Mugler, fall 1995 couture

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Models wearing Spage Age designs by André Courrèges in 1967.

PhotoL Keystone-France / Getty Images

Chalayan fall, 2009ready-to-wear

Photo: Don Ashby & Olivier Claisse

Chalayan fall, 2009ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Iris van Herpen, spring 2011 ready-to-wear

Photo: Michel Zoeter / Courtesy of Iris van Herpen

Schiaparelli, spring 2022 couture

Photo: Filippo Fior / Gorunway.com

Rodarte, fall 2014 ready-to-wear

Photo: Slaven Vlasic / Getty Images

Vetements, spring 2016 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigitalimages.com

Preen by Thorton Bregazzi, fall 2014 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcus Tondo / Indigitalimages.com

Louis Vuitton, spring 2019 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv

Louis Vuitton, spring 2019 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv

Undercover, spring 2019 ready-to-wear

Photo: Courtesy of Undercover

Gucci, fall 2017 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv

Givenchy, fall 2023 couture

Photo: Monica Feudi / Indigital.tv

Givenchy, spring 2002 couture

Photo: Antoine de Parseval / Shoot Digital for Style.com

Balmain, spring 2019 ready-to-wear

Photo: Monica Feudi / Indigital.tv

Alexander McQueen, spring 1997 ready-to-wear

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Louis Vuitton, resort 2023

Photo: Isidore Montag / Gorunway.com

Givenchy, fall 1999 ready-to-wear

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Jean Paul Gaultier, fall 1995 ready-to-wear

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Jean Paul Gaultier, fall 1995 ready-to-wear

Photo: Condé Nast Archive

Givenchy, spring 2014 menswear

Photo: Monica Feudi / FeudiGuaineri.com

Alexander McQueen, fall 2012 ready-to-wear

Photo: Monica Feudi / feudiguaineri.com

Solange in Giles, fall 2015 at the Met gala.

Photo: Jamie McCarthy / FilmMagic

Balmain, spring 2019 couture

Photo: Filippo Fior / Gorunway.com

Alexander McQueen, spring 2010 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Iris Van Herpen, fall 19 couture

Photo: Alessandro Lucioni / Gorunway.com

Stephen Sprouse, fall 1984 ready-to-wear

Photo: Jonathan Postal / Penske Media / Getty Images

Christopher Kane, resort 2011

Photo: Courtesy of Christopher Kane

Giorgio Armani, spring 2013 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / GoRunway.com

Dior Men, pre-fall 2023

Photo: Isidore Montag / Gorunway.com

Dior Men, pre-fall 2023

Photo: Isidore Montag / Gorunway.com

Louis Vuitton, fall 2018 menswear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv

Stephen Sprouse, spring 1985 ready-to-wear

Photo: Amy Meadow for WWD / Getty Images

Schiaparelli, spring 2022 couture

Photo: Filippo Fior / Gorunway.com

Alexander McQueen, fall 2016 ready-to-wear

Photo: Kim WestonArnold / Indigital.tv

Gucci, fall 2016 ready-to-wear

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv

Andrew Gn, fall 2020 ready-to-wear

Photo: Filippo Fior / Gorunway.com

Alexander McQueen, fall 2007 ready-to-wear

Photo: Marcio Madeira

Christian Dior, fall 2011 couture

Photo: Yannis Vlamos / GoRunway.com

Emilio Pucci, fall 2015 ready-to-wear

Photo: Monica Feudi / Feudiguaineri.com

Valentino, pre-fall 2015

Courtesy of Valentino

Viktor & Rolf, fall 2019 couture

Photo: Alessandro Lucioni / Gorunway.com