Cooling Garment for Lunar Spacesuit Unveiled by Axiom Space and Prada
Aerospace-Fashion Partnership Moves From Outer Shell to Skin-Contact Layer for Artemis IV
The inner cooling and ventilation layer of the next-generation lunar spacesuit to be worn by NASA astronauts on the Moon was unveiled in New York City on June 7 by Axiom Space and Prada.
“Every minute astronauts spend outside their vehicle, the LCVG is working to keep them safe.”
Russell Ralston, Axiom Space
The garment, the Liquid Cooling and Ventilation Garment, or LCVG, is engineered as the innermost layer of the Axiom Extravehicular Mobility Unit, known as the AxEMU. It is designed to keep astronauts thermally regulated and able to breathe during spacewalks of up to eight hours on the lunar surface. Axiom Space holds the NASA contract to develop the AxEMU for the Artemis program, which is targeting a crewed lunar landing on Artemis IV.
The two companies first announced their collaboration in 2023. In 2024, they unveiled the AxEMU’s outer shell, built to survive the thermal extremes and micrometeoroid environment of the lunar South Pole. The LCVG represents the next phase, moving from the suit’s protective exterior to the layer worn closest to the astronaut’s body, where thermal regulation, comfort, and reliability carry the most direct life-safety consequences.
The LCVG performs two functions. During a spacewalk, it circulates cold water through a network of tubes routed across the body’s major muscle groups, absorbing metabolic heat and carrying it away to the suit’s portable life-support system, where it is expelled into space. A separate tube loop delivers fresh oxygen across the astronaut’s face, continuously washing away exhaled carbon dioxide. That gas then routes back through the life-support system’s CO2 scrubber before oxygen recirculates to the crew member.
A key engineering feature distinguishes the Axiom LCVG from legacy cooling designs: a fully redundant cooling circuit. If the primary water loop fails, a backup system is available to engage.
Prada contributed expertise in engineered knitting, advanced 3D modeling techniques, and the sourcing of specialized fibers engineered for repeated use across long-duration missions. The fashion house’s role extended beyond materials: its patternmaking knowledge shaped how the network of tubes is distributed across the garment to maintain uniform cooling.
Dr. Jonathan Cirtain, Axiom Space CEO and president, said the partnership produced something neither company could have built independently. “The future of space exploration will not be built by any one entity alone, and our partnership with Prada is proof of that,” Cirtain said. “By bringing together the best in both aerospace engineering as well as luxury craftsmanship and advanced product development, we have developed a garment that neither company could have created independently, and that is exactly the kind of cross-industry thinking that will define the next era of human spaceflight.”
Lorenzo Bertelli, Prada Group Chief Marketing Officer and Head of Sustainability, described the LCVG as “a new achievement born from the unique combination of Axiom Space’s pioneering expertise and Prada’s know-how in design, patternmaking, and advanced materials, ahead of humanity’s return to the lunar surface.”
Russell Ralston, Axiom Space SVP of Spacecraft Development, described what the garment has to accomplish on every outing. “Every minute astronauts spend outside their vehicle, the LCVG is working to keep them safe,” Ralston said. “It manages their thermal environment, supports their breathing, and does it all while they’re pushing their bodies to the limit. The work we have done with Prada has taken that capability to a level we could not have achieved alone.”
The AxEMU is slated for use on NASA’s Artemis IV mission, which would mark the first crewed lunar landing since Apollo 17 in December 1972, more than 50 years ago.