The new spacesuit that will go to the moon sometime in the 2030s looks similar to the ones worn by some of the Apollo astronauts in the 1970s, down to the red accents and the baby blue boot soles. But the retro feel is deceiving. The truth is, these suits are significantly different from the old garments worn by Neil Armstrong and the other 23 men who first flew to our satellite. And while they are not as sleek as the SpaceX EVA suit or as menacing as NASA’s Z2 prototype that may go to Mars one day, the Artemis astronauts that will (hopefully) wear it sometime in the next decade, will enjoy plenty of new design features that are the distillation of decades in space wear development.
Called the Axiom Extravehicular Mobility Unit, the new suit is based on the original lunar space suit developed by NASA in 2019, which was called the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU). The AxEMU was revealed earlier this month, at the International Astronautical Congress in Milan by the two companies that designed and built it.
The first, Axiom Space, makes sense. Founded by ex-NASA employees, the commercial spaceflight corporation launched the first private mission to the International Space Station in 2022. NASA also selected it to add new modules to the ISS, and it’s even planning its own private orbital station. The second one, however, feels extremely alien to this world: luxury fashion brand Prada.
It’s hard to imagine how a company known for making handbags and shoes for the jet set could contribute anything to the critical gear worn by the rocket set. You can picture Prada adding some fancy styling, but that’s about it. Ironically, however, it seems that it was quite the contrary, at least according to Matt Ondler, President of Axiom Space, who says that Prada has contributed “its expertise in design, materials, and sewing techniques” to make a functional suit capable of withstanding the extreme conditions of the moon’s south pole.
The Milan-based fashion brand was apparently key in making sure the AxEMU’s outer layer provided the right thermal protection, flexibility to the astronaut, and resistance against lunar dust. According to Lorenzo Bertelli, Prada Group’s Chief Marketing Officer and self-described space fan, his company shared “their expertise on high-performance materials, features, and sewing techniques” to make the suits as durable as possible.
Retro looks
The new suits are white (which is used to reflect as much sunlight heat as possible) and accented with gray, blue, and red. It’s a color combo that is similar to NASA’s suits from the 1970s, when the designers at Collins Aerospace created suits for the Apollo 15 mission.
Back then, red stripes were added to the white silhouette to distinguish the mission commander from the lunar module pilot during extravehicular activities (EVAs), as both NASA astronauts wore nearly identical suits. The red markings included stripes on the arms, legs, and a big vertical line on top of the helmet, which became iconic. The high contrast visual markers helped with easy identification in the harsh lighting conditions on the lunar surface, where there’s no atmosphere to soften the blinding sunlight. The light blue soles used on the AxEMU suit boots also have an identical look to the ones used in all Apollo missions.
Where these suits change in a big way is in its vital and safety systems. Unlike its Apollo predecessors, the AxEMU is equipped with an onboard diagnostic system that actively monitors suit conditions, such as oxygen levels, pressure, and temperature, alerting astronauts to potential issues. Additionally, the AxEMU uses a regenerable carbon dioxide scrubbing system, which is completely different from the original suits that relied on changeable, disposable filters that were inside attachable backpacks and connected to the front of the suits via a tube.
The new regenerable CO2 scrubbing system was first used in NASA’s 2019 xEMU suit and features two different absorption beds made of a material called lithium hydroxide, which attracts and traps carbon dioxide, a poisonous gas exhaled by humans while breathing. CO2 is extremely dangerous if it reaches a certain saturation point in the blood (as anyone who has watched Apollo 13 knows).
While one filtering bed is in use, the other is exposed to the vacuum of space to be “emptied,” allowing continuous CO2 scrubbing without requiring astronauts to return inside the lunar lander to replace filters. This type of technology has been successfully used on the International Space Station (ISS) at a bigger scale and represents a significant advancement over the expendable scrubbing canisters used in previous suits.
No sleek design
Despite Prada involvement, the AxEMU’s is less about fashion and more about safety and comfort, just like the bulky but extremely dependable Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU), which has been used by NASA astronauts on the International Space Station for decades. Designed for long-duration spacewalks, the EMU has been a reliable workhorse with its extensive life support and multiple layers of insulation, built to withstand the demands of hours-long space missions.
By comparison, SpaceX’s sleek Extra-Vehicular Activity (EVA) suit—worn by Jared Isaacman during the Polaris Dawn mission—is built for an entirely different type of mission. These tight, white space pajamas are optimized for short exposures to space, always attached to a spaceship using long tubes, so there’s no need for backpacks or scrubbers. Every vital function is handled by the mothership. This, of course, would be impossible for EVA on the moon, where astronauts need to roam freely in any direction, even riding on lunar rovers.
In fact, the AxEMU is precisely the opposite of SpaceX’s suit: it’s entirely focused on mobility and comfort. If you have seen old videos of the Apollo missions, walking on the moon is no easy task. This wasn’t only the product of the low gravity, though. The Apollo astronauts moved with a characteristic, almost awkward bounce partly due to the limitations of their suits. The AxEMU aims to change that with better joint systems, allowing astronauts a far greater range of motion—whether they’re collecting rock samples or deploying scientific instruments. In theory, these will make the astronauts’ activity a lot easier.
The next-gen space suit
Perhaps surprisingly, the AxEMU doesn’t include one advanced key safety feature that was implemented in the most advanced spacesuit in existence: NASA’s Z2 prototype. The Z2, which is still a next-generation planetary prototype, is specifically designed for future missions to Mars. Unlike the SpaceX EVA or the AxEMU, the Z2 features advanced further mobility enhancements, including a new lower torso assembly that provides improved hip and knee flexibility thanks to a combination of hard composite elements and bendable components. This will be crucial for durability in Mars missions.
The Z2’s most crucial component, however, is its hard suit-port docking interface. This mechanism allows the astronaut to dock the suit directly to a Mars habitat or rover without needing to get inside through an airlock. Practically, this means the suit’s hard back is connected to the exterior of the Mars base or rover through an external hatch. The astronaut enters the suit by stepping into it through this hatch. Once inside, the back of the suit and the hatch seal off. The astronaut undocks to begin the mission while the habitat stays shut and safe. When the astronaut returns, they re-dock the suit to the habitat or rover, exiting through the same rear-entry mechanism, while the suit itself remains outside the habitat.
The system keeps the suit in the external environment, preventing Martian dust from being brought into the habitat, eliminating the risk of Martian dust contamination. Mars’ pervasive and fine dust particles could pose significant risks to both equipment and astronaut health, and this design eliminates that risk.
So why doesn’t the AxEMU implement this clever mechanism? After all, the challenges posed by lunar regolith are as bad, or even worse, than Martian dust. Lunar dust is highly abrasive, electrostatically charged, and known to cling to spacesuits, posing potential health hazards and equipment degradation. From a practical point of view, it makes sense to have the same suit-port mechanism.
The reality, however, is that the Z2 suit is specifically engineered for Mars missions, where long-term planetary exploration—measured in months—will benefit from a suit-port docking mechanism that keeps dust and contaminants out of habitats. The AxEMU is focused on the Artemis program, where moon stays will be much shorter—measured in days—until we establish a permanent base.
In these conditions, traditional airlocks, coupled with procedures to minimize lunar dust exposure, are considered sufficient to manage the risks of lunar regolith contamination. Developing the suit-port docking system would have involved additional engineering challenges and costs, which are not be justifiable for the shorter duration of lunar missions. And the suit and lunar lander—a version of the Starship made by SpaceX—development have already been delayed by several years, multiple times. The priority is to get boots on the lunar surface before the decade ends so, for now, the AeXMU is as good as it gets.
