The US sports label have partnered with Virgin Galactic (Richard Branson’s space-tourism company) in order to make commercial space travel a reality, rather than a far-off fantasy that most of us watch in films or television.
It was announced on January 24th that Under Armour would design and produce the ‘spacewear’ that would be worn by both the pilots and the passengers on board their ships. Under Armour will also be making uniforms for other Virgin Galactic Staff, including engineers and mission-control operators.
The companies will reveal the full line of clothing and footwear later this year, which will launch to much media attention and excitement.
Under Armour’s experience with creating performance gear for athletes, means that Under Armour will be perfectly suited to creating clothes for space travel due to their expertise with the technical aspects of the engineering process. Indeed, its athletic-performance team will create programs to physically prepare astronauts for space flight and recovery.
This does not mean that the task of designing suits for commercial space travel will come without its obstacles. The standard requirements for these suits will not be as rigorous as those for the suits that must protect astronauts who work outside of a spacecraft, but this does not mean that designing spacesuits will be as easy as designing comfortable athleisure wear.
Richard Branson has stated ‘I have followed Under Armour’s progress through a personal friendship with its CEO, Kevin Plank and via the great relationships it has established over the years with various Virgin companies. I’ve loved its determination to push technical boundaries in order to improve performance, so could not have been more pleased when Kevin and his talented teams stepped up to the considerable task of creating a range of space apparel and performance programmes for Virgin Galactic.’
The full range of apparel and footwear is set to be revealed later this year, ahead of Richard Branson’s inaugural commercial flight.
Karen Sparrow, Virgin Galactic’s Spaceline Apparel manager will share some of the exciting developments and innovations for their next generation of spacewear range at the PCIAW® Summit on the 18th June 2019.
To hear Karen’s exciting presentation please visit https://pciaw.org/pciaw-summit-2019/buy-tickets/
For more information on Under Armour’s partnership with Virgin Galactic please visit https://qz.com and https://www.virgin.com/
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