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Space Habitats Are Getting an Extreme Makeover
The future of living and working in outer space is starting to look less like the inside of a tin can and more like a comfy cruise ship.
From cork-lined walls to algae-tinted windows, the future of living and working in outer space looks less like a weightless tin can and more like a comfy cruise ship.
These living quarters promise more room, more light and more color than before, while also protecting occupants from the dangers of radiation and orbiting debris that could rupture the hull of a spacecraft.
“Space will never be comparable to a five-star resort, but when you go, there needs to be a level of comfort, a level of safety and a level of stimulation,” said Sebastian Aristotelis, co-founder of SAGA Space Architects, a Danish firm that is working with the European Space Agency to design and build space habitats.
Aristotelis and others are creating structures that weigh less than previous spacecraft, are cheaper to launch and can be rapidly assembled and expanded as needed. They also will provide more volume for living, working and recreation than the cramped International Space Station, which NASA expects to retire in 2030 after three decades of service.
Like a massive Lego set, the space station was pieced together with separate modules transported to space in 42 launches over several years at a cost of $100 billion. Designers of new habitats say they can cut the cost to $100 million for a 10-person habitat.
Saleem Miyan, CEO of Max Space, a commercial space firm based at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, said the company’s pumpkin-shaped inflatable living space is made from composite synthetic materials that are stronger and lighter than aluminum, titanium or steel, materials used to construct the space station.
Putting a lighter, cheaper habitat in space “allows you to create an environment that isn’t a small tin-can type of feeling, but actually something that feels more like a home with different floors,” Miyan said.
When packed for launch, the firm’s Alpha habitat is about the size of two roll-on suitcases. It opens in orbit to 20 cubic meters, enough to fit three people, and is meant to serve as a free-floating warehouse or lab.
Alpha has already been flight-tested to NASA specifications and will have the ability to dock with ISS or a future commercial space station. Max Space is scheduled to launch its first Alpha habitat, which will host a commercial scientific payload, on a SpaceX rocket in October 2026, Miyan said.
A planned 100-cubic-meter human habitat would hold 10 people. Max Space expects companies or individuals to pay to visit the habitats or use them to conduct research or house commercial satellites.
Meanwhile, Aurelia Institute, a nonprofit space architecture lab based in Cambridge, Mass., is building a habitat that uses self-assembling hexagonal tiles that snap together to form a geodesic dome.
A microwave-size version is scheduled to launch early in 2026 to the space station, where it will open up by itself and float inside the station as part of a grant from NASA and the ISS National Lab in collaboration with Axiom Space, a private space company.
It’s a test of whether the tiles will self-assemble in zero-gravity. If all goes well, Aurelia plans to launch a larger free-floating version that would fit four people, according to Ariel Ekblaw, the institute’s co-founder and CEO.
Interior features of Aurelia’s Tesserae Pavilion include the GreenVault, a fermentation station, algae window, inflatables and a hand-knotted net.
While these commercial firms are developing free-floating habitats, architects and engineers at the European Space Agency are assembling a prototype of a future home for astronauts on the moon or Mars.
The four-person Future Lunar Exploration Habitat, or FlexHAB, is a shipping container-size habitat attached to a massive hangar in Cologne, Germany, where researchers are testing how astronauts can handle various tools and instruments on the lunar surface while wearing spacesuits, according to Matthias Maurer, a German astronaut who spent nearly six months on the space station in 2020.
To soften the feel of the interior, surfaces are 3D-printed in recycled wastewood. Handgrips on a ladder are lined with cork, which is a good insulator and can withstand high temperatures without burning. Sleeping areas are soundproof and have independent air filtration so that smells and noises don’t drift from one compartment to the next, Maurer said.
At the same time that engineers are testing structures to withstand the heat and vibration of a rocket launch and the dangers of space, designers are thinking about what the habitats should look and feel like on the inside.
“You can treat it like an RV,” Aurelia’s Ekblaw said. “You can have furniture that folds out from the inside of the tiles directly into this open and habitable chamber.”
Space architects and designers put a premium on windows.
Aurelia’s future habitat includes plans for a porthole that would use colorful algae to simulate a stained-glass window and might also be able to produce oxygen for the crew, according to Ekblaw.
Vast, a company based in Long Beach, Calif., that is building a commercial space station to launch next year, is incorporating a 3.5-foot-diameter domed window. Garrett Reisman, a consultant with Vast and a former NASA astronaut who spent three months on the space station in 2008, said the only thing more important than a good closet is access to a window.
He recalled how light from Earth reflected onto the walls near his sleep area through a small porthole.
“You’d see greens and blues and whites from the ocean and the clouds,” he said. “It would almost be like a projector you put in your kids’ room to make pretty shapes on the ceiling. It was really a cool effect.”
Inside Vast’s planned Haven 1 space station.
Write to Eric Niiler at eric.niiler@wsj.com
