Founded by British designers and twin brothers Nick and Steve Tidball, the premium fashion brand uses advanced material technology to tackle challenges, such as space exploration and climate change to human health. 2x winners at TIME Best Inventions, their designs include a jacket built entirely from the technology used to land Rovers on Mars, electromagnetic shielding suits, jackets built from copper and wood, and the first computer programmable clothing.
Architecture firm SAGA develops advanced habitats for extreme environments. Working with the European Space Agency, they design living quarters and labs that address the physiological and psychological demands of life in space. Their designs have been tested in the Arctic, the desert, and the International Space Station, including a full-scale lunar habitat for ESA’s astronaut training centre in Cologne and a lighting payload onboard the ISS helping astronauts to sleep better in alien environments.
Together, the two have developed Vollebak Spaceshop, aiming to offer a glimpse into a future of interplanetary drone deliveries between Earth, the Moon and Mars. Fitted with Bang & Olufsen’s Beolab 5 and Beosound 2 speakers, it’s capable of delivering approximately 120 dB SPL (Sound Pressure Level), where the sound is considered to be at the threshold of pain. The cargo onboard the Spaceshop includes Vollebak’s Martian Aerogel Jackets built from the hypersonic parachutes that landed the last rovers on Mars, Full Metal Jackets built from 11 kilometres of disease-resistant copper, and electromagnetic Shielding Suits to combat cosmic and earthly radiation.
— This kind of project comes around maybe only once in a career, says Sebastian Aristotelis, SAGA Co-founder and Lead Architect. The chance to think through a future in which intergalactic deliveries between Earth, the Moon and Mars are a part of everyday reality. No different to how we think about getting the things we buy delivered to our door today, just on an interplanetary scale.
— When we thought about our first shop, we didn’t simply think about one city or even one planet. We thought about a future in which stores would come to you, bringing the things you needed when you needed them, regardless of whether you were hanging out on the beach in LA, or mining asteroids in space, says Vollebak Co-founder Nick Tidball.
Take us through the development process.
— Nick is a difficult client, but one of the best ones, because he always wants things to be wilder, Aristotelis shares. He wants to take risks and pushes us to do further. We had a chat in the design team where we said that in the future, when we have a colony on Mars, on Earth, and on the moon, we’ll need to ship the clothing from one planet system to another. What does that look like? What does that part of the industry look like? It’s of course going to be containers, but a different type of container, and engine parts that are detachable.
— When the new SpaceX Starship rocket is finished, the price of sending something to orbit is actually the same as FedExing a kilogram to Australia. Does that make sense? It’s actually not that expensive, I’ll be able to send stuff to space out of my own pocket, not the company’s pocket.
— When someone has ordered something on Mars, this entire container (the Spaceshop) would be packed by Vollebak, and an engine would arrive, pick up the container unit, and ship it to Mars. That’s the thought. We went through a lot of design iterations, and everything is real metal parts. And then we got introduced to Bang Olufsen’s huge anodisation baths, which is the coolest thing. We’ve used the exact same anodisation bath that they treat their speakers in for the entire panelling at the Spaceshop. The entire underneath structure is black carbon steel, and you can see all the welding marks — we wanted to keep it completely honest and raw. Then, we gave it a clear coat so it won’t rust.
What’s the weight?
— It’s only 1,025 kg, so quite lightweight — you can carry it if you are a handful of people.
The first Spaceshop pop-up concept was launched at Bjarke Ingels Group’s (BIG) new Copenhagen HQ last week. As part of the event, Vollebak also presented a limited edition speaker collab with Bang & Olufsen’s Beosound 2 model. Each piece is one-of-a-kind, with an anodised aluminium finish that simulates rocket burn and the residue of cosmic noise.
— This is the start of the tour, because Seb (Aristoteles, Ed’s note) built it here, and I also love Copenhagen as a city; there are some brilliant designers here. Now, our website opens up for tickets for us going to Austin, Tokyo, Dubai, London, and New York with Spaceshop. Lots of people, when they find out that Vollebak exists, think that we’re an amazing brand, but people don’t necessarily know us around the world. So, we’re using this to go help say ’hi, we exist.’
— It’s always struck me that it’s really odd to have a shop, with a 6-month or a 2-year lease, says Tidball. It just didn’t make any sense in my brain, and I’d much rather have this as a beautiful object that we’re all incredibly proud of and take it around to the different markets.
And retail experts have pointed out the importance of creating an experience for the consumers when you’re working with physical retail. This is quite an experience.
—There have been some really amazing shops created, Tidball continues. I’ve seen a few, and some that Rem Koolhaas has done. But for me, there’s nothing better than seeing people’s reactions here: leaning over, taking pictures, laughing, and smiling. From my experience, if you want to get people engaged with something, if you can build an object that makes people laugh and smile, that’s a good idea. It just is. If you think about all the favourite things you’ve seen, the best art or films, they’re brave, they’re interesting, they’re new, they’re funny, they’re a bit wild. For me, shops are kind of static and boring. This is the opposite of static and boring.
And you’re gonna sell tickets to a pop-up?
— I think what’s gonna happen is that no one knows about this yet. However, what I would love to happen is to cut forward to 2 to 3 years, and the Spaceshop is coming to Tokyo. I don’t think you could ever get it to El Bulli status, where they’re selling tickets for the dinner, but I do think you can get it as like a viewing where people literally will queue to go and see it and queue to go and get stuff from the Spaceship. That’s a fun idea that I’d love to be in charge of, Tidball concludes.
