In April 1961, when Yuri Gagarin became the first man in orbit in his Vostock 1 spacecraft, which was adapted from the Sputnik satellite model, an image of the cosmonaut was broadcast around the world. He wore an orange-zippered reflective nylon jumpsuit, a round gray visor helmet with the black letters CCCP edged on the front, heavy leather gloves, leather boots, and a leather headset. Baptised the SK-1 (for the Russian skafandr kosmicheskiy which translates to “diving suit for space”), this suit, protective only inside the Vostock capsule, evolved from different versions of diving suits, as well as high-altitude pressure suits developed and used by balloonists and military pilots, particularly those testing jets developed before the Korean War.
     At a height of over 19,000 feet above sea level, oxygen is nearly nonexistent and the pressure level is so high that the body requires a hermetic unit that duplicates the atmospheric conditions and pressures on the ground but not in a restrained manner, but also allows movement to perform various tasks. When so much of modern fashion design can be dismissed as frivolous and non-utilitarian—who truly needs all those massive ball gowns, for example—spacesuit design follows a very strict regimen: function dictates forms, shapes, and materials. Each spacesuit is an unfinished garment whereby a combination of trial-and-error mock-ups are tested to see what works and what doesn’t. One model follows the next in a systematic adaptation of the suit, with different materials dictated by the different purposes which have arisen in the development of space travel.  
    Modern space suits are specifically modeled to serve each mission’s prime directive, whether it’s an orbital flight, a spacewalk, or a Moon landing. Each suit is a complex combination of clothing, special equipment, and environmental systems worn as a multi-layered combination whereby a layer of rubber regulates pressure and is topped by a layer of restraint fabric to make the suit flexible and prevent the body bladder to blow up. Imagine how the soft tube layer works inside of a rubber hard shell of a tire.  
    Yuri Gagarin’s suit, the SK-1, evolved from earlier models like the full-pressure skafandr made by Yevgeny Chertovsky in 1931, remains the most basic of spacesuits as it was used primarily for a very short orbital flight inside of a pressurized spacecraft where specialized clothing is not necessary to stay alive. For successive missions, like the first full day in orbit by cosmonaut Gherman Titov or the first spacewalk by Alexei Leonov, the SK-1 evolved into the Berkut suit where an oxygen backpack was attached to the air supply and cooling systems. In later models, Zvezda, the Soviet manufacturer, modified suits to allow for sustaining short spacewalks, and finally, suits that had a small regenerative life support system for extra vehicular activities.  
Similarly, the suit used for the first U.S.-manned space mission was originally a U.S. Navy Mark IV high altitude vacuum suit made by BFGoodrich for cold weather flights (itself an adaptation of Wiley Post’s hard-shell flight suits from 1934) and made of neoprene-coated nylon and a top layer of aluminized nylon. By sewing a fabric break at the joints, the astronaut had slightly higher flexibility for greater mobility.
    The Moon landing was the culmination of the American space program. Hamilton Standard developed the Integrated Maneuvering Life Support System (IMLSS) for the USAF Manned Orbiting Laboratory in 1968, a suit dubbed the MOL that could operate by an umbilical cord or disconnect completely from the space module. The IMLSS was similar to its Soviet cousin, the Krechet, in that it was a rigid suit with flexible limbs, and it eventually became the A7L, a portable life system suit with thermal and meteoroid protection. This was the suit that Neil Armstrong wore for the lunar landing in 1969.
    Prolonged voyages into space require suit designers to address the problems of body fluid accumulation in a zero gravity environment. Specific challenges like weightlessness and landing pressure forced the Soviets to make the Chibis suit that pushed fluids towards the leg so they wouldn’t rise to the mask area, and the Sokol K-1 that was developed after the Soyuz 11 decompression accident. As extended spacewalk progressed, the solution was a suit that featured pressurized gloves that allowed for detailed work in space—the suits evolved into the sophisticated Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU) used for Skylabs and the Orlan (based on the Krechet) used for the Mir Space Station missions.
    Designers and engineers have started to address the next generation of spacesuit even though the upcoming Project Constellation was delayed until 2015. Developed at MIT by a team under Professor Dava Newman, the Bio-Suit seeks to erase the spacesuit designs of the past 50 years. To achieve greater mobility, the Bio-Suit favors a very slim form-fitted silhouette that abolishes the cumbersome weight of current suits. The Mark III prototype utilizes a mixture of hard and soft components that allow the astronaut’s transition from one environment to the next without the risk of depressurization.
    Fashioning a spacesuit requires the use of the most innovative materials available: a linen-cotton-rubber mix, neoprene, thermal reflective materials, beta cloths made of fiberglass and polyester, Dacron, Mylar, Nomex, Kapton, silicones, Chromel-R (a woven chromium), and stainless steel. These synthetic materials were adapted for spacesuits because of their aptness to alleviate certain extreme conditions. These materials ended up having greater influence and use on Earth than in space.
    Specifically, modern fashion benefited immensely from the fusion of materials that scientists were testing for use in space into natural fabrics—Teflon and neoprene were mixed with cotton and silk in the same manner engineers utilized these new components to craft individual spacesuits. The Lycra fiber, invented in 1959 by DuPont scientists, changed how clothes are manufactured in a way that even the most influential fashion designers of the time could never have imagined. The ‘70s era of metal and punk rockers—Queen, Iron Maiden, Ratt—popularized Lycra through their ubiquitous spandex leggings. Would David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust costumes have been as colorful and inventive, or would there have been a glitter and glam rock era at all, without spandex? Today, synthetic fibers are so integral to the fabrics of our clothes that Lycra has become virtually invisible.  
Materials play a role in ushering changes in how clothes can be made. Stretch fabrics allowed fashion designers to create fitted silhouettes in the early ‘90s that echoed the spread of gym culture. But clothes made from a mixture of manmade and natural fibers fell out of flavor in the early ‘90s during the grunge period, when authenticity and vintage ideals were worshipped. And today, with the return of couture and the thrust towards a heritage- and luxury-driven sentiment that emphasizes natural fabrics and handmade clothes, Lycra is once again marginalized, surviving temporarily in the form of jeggings, those stretchy denim-print leggings which are somehow making synthetic blends’ last stand through tacky reality TV shows.

Suited for Space, a SITES exhibition, will be open at the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago from April through September, 2011.