A NEW ERA FOR SPACE FASHION

JEFF BEZOS' FIANCEE TEAMS UP WITH MONSE TO REDESIGN BLUE ORIGIN FLIGHT SUITS FOR AN ALL-FEMALE LAUNCH

- STORY: VANESSA FRIEDMAN / NYT

What do you wear for your first trip to space?

If you are like most people, probably whatever spacesuit or astronaut outfit the company (or government agency) you are flying with provides. However, if you are Lauren Sánchez journalist, pilot, children's book author, philanthropist and fiancee of Jeff Bezos, the second-richest man on the planet you have another idea. You think, "Let's reimagine the flight suit"

"Usually, you know, these suits are made for a man," Sánchez said recently on a video call from the West Coast. "Then they get tailored to fit a woman." Or not tailored: an all-female spacewalk, planned in 2019, had to be cancelled because Nasa did not have two spacesuits that fit two women. (Instead they sent out one woman and one man.)

But Sánchez is part of the first all-female flight since Russia sent Valentina Tereshkova on a solo flight in 1963. She will be going up on a Blue Origin flight with a pop star (Katy Perry), a journalist (Gayle King), two scientist/ activists (Amanda Nguyen, Aisha Bowe) and a film producer (Kerianne Flynn). Feeling like yourself is what makes you feel powerful, she said, and you shouldn't have to sacrifice that because space has been well, a mostly male space. Even if you are a space tourist, rather than a full-fledged astronaut.

So, five months ago, Sánchez got in touch with Fernando Garcia and Laura Kim, co-founders of the brand Monse, who are also creative directors of Oscar de la Renta's (Garcia and Kim made Sánchez's 2024 Met Gala outfit). She wanted to know if they would work with Blue Origin, Bezos' space company.

"I was like: Right away!" Garcia said over Zoom. The result of their collaboration was unveiled last week, when Sánchez and crew climbed into the Blue Origin rocket in West Texas and took off for their approximately 11-minute trip past the Kármán line and into zero gravity.