On June 12th, 2014, Betabrand hosted a series of speakers from various space-industry luminaries at an event called Mission Control. The goal: To put minds from the worlds of space and design together and create design direction for a new space-themed streetwear capsule collection for Betabrand. As a designer at Betabrand and the creator of the Space Jacket, I was asked to give a talk about how to weave disparate themes together (like space + street) to create a unique design voice.

1. How to Become a Designer (In Case the Whole
Astronaut Thing Doesn’t Work Out for You)
Steven B. Wheeler
Senior Designer, Betabrand
@stevenbwheeler
#missioncontrol
In this talk, i’ll cover three easy steps anyone (with a little patience, inspiration, and
resourcefulness) can follow to achieve great design. Plus, a little history and a brief
discussion of streetwear to get us all more or less on the same page.

2. How do I design _____?
(Hint: Stick with what you know.)
Common question or comment: How do I become a Designer? How do I design this (blank)?
I wish I could design something.

3. Step 1: Find your Inspiration.
(What excites you and the people around you?)
Step 1: Inspiration. What inspires you? What is the story you’re trying to tell? What do you
want people to think when they see your design? Luxury? Athleticism? Retro appeal?
Toughness? Celebrity? An anti-establishment, fuck you vibe?

4. This sense of wonder and fascination with the space program was fostered mainly by two
things: first was my 4th and 5th grade teacher, Mrs. Husser. She was a pilot, and focused
heavily on science in her classroom. The other? Estes model rockets!

5. Here’s the source of inspiration for the Space Jacket?: The NASA I grew up with. I saw
this logo a lot in my childhood.

6. Here’s the source of inspiration for the Space Jacket?: The NASA I grew up with. This
image, and countless others like it from the 80s and 90s, are more than a photo. It’s a
legacy of heroism and courage and the fundamental human need to explore and dive into
the unknown.

7. The MLI foil was a recurring theme when doing visual research.

8. Step 2: Decide on a product.
(And start gathering everything you might need.)
Step 1: product. For the space jacket, I picked a jacket because I wanted to work on
something I could wear. At this point, I wasn’t thinking about marketability, demographics,
trademark issues, or anything like that. I wanted something for me. And that something was
a jacket.

9. I started with this: The North Face Thermoball jacket. I used to work at TNF on products like
this. It seemed like a good starting point.

10. In fact, here’s my Thermoball jacket being sacrificed to make a pattern from.

11. Of course, who among us doesn’t already own a collection of authentic mission patches?

12. Step 3: Put it all together.
(The easy part!)
Step 3: Materials (the hard part). Quilting took the better part of 3 months to figure out. The
other components, plus the techniques to put them all together, took about 6 months.

13. I put it all together on my sewing machine at home.

14. 3 Steps to Design:
1.Find your inspiration.
2.Decide on a product & gather materials.
3.Put it all together.
Summary: 3 steps.

15. The result?
The result? Something that wouldn’t otherwise exist. It needed you to breathe life into it and
bring it into the world. Something…

16. Like this.

18. So… What is streetwear?
(It’s like porn; I know it when I see it.)
So, second obstacle? What the f*ck is street wear? There are a lot of things that could be
streetwear.

19. Surf + Skate Bling + Irreverence Big Logo + Sports
Streetwear is a style of fashion or dress rooted in west coast surf/skate culture. The 80s and
90s saw the punk/underground/DIY aesthetic of the movement start to morph into a look
adopted by rap/hip-hop artists and large athletic brands like nike and adidas. Still, it’s not
easy to define. Look for athletic sport motifs, bold color, camouflage, irreverence, big logos.

20. Camo everything

21. Surf/skate theme based on west-coast roots. NY Graffiti can play into this very well (ECKO)

22. Popular streetwear components to explore: brand/logo everything, collaborate with
everyone.

23. How to design Space Streetwear
(Follow the 3 steps. You wrote those down, right?)
So, with a basic understanding of the core of streetwear (we’ve seriously barely even
scratched the surface), lets talk about how to approach the design of “Space Streetwear”
and see where it takes us.

24. Step 1: Find your Inspiration.
Lets try this out in practice… Step one

25. Bandana print motifs are huge, so that’s the first ingredient. How about engineering
diagrams? Those might work. Lets rework a bandana print to incorporate some space
elements and see how that does.

26. Damn, son! Soyuz rocket cross section, apollo lander modules, phases of the moon, shuttles
all listed out in the order of their construction (even the one that never flew and was only
used for atmospheric glide testing). Subtle paisley elements around the borders to keep it
visually connected to the traditional bandana. Its all here!

27. Step 2: Decide on a product.
So we’ve got a space-themed bandana print. Where do we go from there?

28. I saw more than a few shirts like this when doing some visual research this week.

29. Step 3: Put it all together.
So lets combine these things in the third and final step and see what we get…

30. Bingo!

31. + =
Let’s try it again: Imagery from the Lunar Reconnoissance Orbiter (LRO), plus the classic
windbreaker silhouette, equals a space themed streetwear windbreaker.

32. Repeat 100x
Now just keep doing this a few hundred times, weed out the stuff that doesn’t work, and see
where it takes you.

33. Here’s a little capsule collection i put together this week to help illustrate the concept. But
YOU are all here to weigh in and contribute your ideas. Let’s recap the steps one last time
before we break…

34. 3 Steps to Design:
1.Find your inspiration.
2.Decide on a product & gather materials.
3.Put it all together.
(quick recap)

35. @stevenbwheeler
#missioncontrol
And with that, lets get this evening's event started! Thank you so much everyone!