Senior Vice President of Advanced Product Development Ryan Saylor discusses this giant leap for the optical brand on its 50th anniversary.

Fifty years of Oakley &mdash; what do you make of that? This milestone is a reminder of why Oakley exists: to challenge convention and elevate human <a href="https://www.hommessingapore.com/living/best-high-performance-bodycare-for-men-grooming-skincare-luxury-self-care-2025" target="_blank" rel="noopener">performance</a> through innovation. For half a century, the brand has operated with a mindset that refuses to settle, always asking how we can see clearer, move faster, and push further. 
Instead of looking back, we treat this <a href="https://www.hommessingapore.com/living/tumi-50-year-anniversary-gold-ccapsule-collection-travel-luggages-limited-edition" target="_blank" rel="noopener">anniversary</a> as a springboard. A moment to honour the breakthroughs that shaped us. But more importantly, to double-down on the curiosity and engineering obsession that will shape the next era. Our north star has always been singular and unwavering: a commitment to redefining what&rsquo;s possible. And 50 years in, that vision feels more alive than ever.

The Ellipse is created to mark the 50th anniversary and resembles the iconic Oakley logo. What else inspired its design? It reminds us of Cyclops from the X-Men... The Ellipse is deliberately shaped like the Oakley &ldquo;O&rdquo; as a gesture of legacy and identify, but the thinking went deeper. We asked: how do we honour our heritage while offering something fresh and relevant? One idea was a singular-lens field of vision &mdash; a wide, uninterrupted, strong silhouette, which absolutely echoes the Cyclops reference you mentioned.
But we also looked at architecture, industrial design, even space helmet visors. We considered purity of form, minimal interference on the lens plane, boldness of frame, and also maximal optical clarity. So the Ellipse isn&rsquo;t just a design statement; it&rsquo;s a technical one as well. An evolution of the Oakley identity, carried forward into the future. 
After five decades of pushing the boundaries of optical performance and design on Earth, Oakley is now taking its expertise to the moon with Axiom Space. Was this a natural trajectory for the brand, or a surprising opportunity? I&rsquo;d say it&rsquo;s both. If you trace Oakley&rsquo;s lineage (in extreme sports, racing, outdoor, tactical), you see a history of performance in unforgiving environments &mdash; dealing with high speeds, vibration, glare, dust, impact and so much more. Going to space is simply the ultimate extension of that.
But no one casually says &ldquo;let&rsquo;s design lunar eyewear.&rdquo; The Axiom Space collaboration is an extraordinary opportunity that we approached with great humility and seriousness. Yes, it makes perfect sense in the broader arc of our brand, but it&rsquo;s also a remarkable and unexpected step. A moon mission is not just another product line; it&rsquo;s proof of our design ethos at the highest level.

The next person to walk on the moon will be wearing Oakley. How does that feel? It&rsquo;s a mix of pride, excitement, and deep respect. To be part of a mission like Artemis III, and knowing that our work could contribute to human exploration beyond Earth, is staggering. On a personal level, it validates every late night, every prototype iteration, every decision to raise the spec again. But it also underscores what&rsquo;s at stake, which drives us to push the boundaries of innovation even further. If we&rsquo;re trusted at that level, then we must bring that same rigour and vision into everything we create.
The most striking feature of the visor is its 24-karat gold coating. What&rsquo;s it like working with the material, and could it find its way into commercial pieces? The gold coating is a brilliant example of a material engineered to perform in extreme environmental conditions. In space where you have direct solar exposure, no atmospheric filtering of UV and infrared radiation, deep shadows and sharp contrast, gold provides exceptional infrared reflection and stabilises visible light transmittance.
It&rsquo;s technically challenging to work with: you need extreme precision for the deposition process, and the substrate must be able withstand a micrometeoroid-dust environment, all while providing optical clarity that meets the astronaut&rsquo;s needs. While a full 24-karat coating isn&rsquo;t practical or cost-effective for everyday wear, the underlying learnings absolutely transfer. Deposition methods, optical treatments, scratch-resistant coatings proven for lunar dust &mdash; those technologies will inform future commercial products. You&rsquo;ll see the influence of the full gold coating used in space, even if it remains unique for this lunar mission.

What are your thoughts on commercial brands driving this next chapter of space exploration? We now have Prada contributing spacesuit design, Nikon with camera technology, and now Oakley with visor technology. It&rsquo;s a powerful reflection of how exploration and commerce are converging, and how consumer technology, heritage performance brands and space agencies can align in new, meaningful ways. For Oakley, working with Axiom Space shows how the line between everyday performance gear and equipment for extreme environments is becoming increasingly seamless.
However, we believe innovation should be driven by purpose and not just novelty. When you see companies like Prada doing spacesuits or Nikon doing lunar cameras, it means the market for design, functionality, and human-rated gear is expanding. That&rsquo;s good for everyone &mdash; the engineers, the brands, and ultimately the users. The question for us remains: are we solving meaningful problems? Are we elevating human capability? Because whether it&rsquo;s terrestrial or lunar, that insistence is what keeps the innovation honest.
Now that Oakley&rsquo;s headed to space, where to next? Looking ahead, Oakley&rsquo;s next 50 years are about exploring the unknown: new environments, new challenges, new ways to push human performance. If the moon is one frontier, the next could be beyond Earth, beneath the ocean, or in places we haven&rsquo;t even imagined yet. What drives us remains the same: curiosity, creativity, and the desire to turn the seemingly impossible into reality.

&ldquo;A moon mission is not just another product line; it&rsquo;s proof of our design ethos at the highest level.&rdquo;

Oakley Sets its Sights on the Moon with Axiom Space

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