Satellites and silk conjure earthly delights

It’s called the “overview effect”—a term coined by space philosopher and writer Frank White in a book of the same name. It’s the mental shift that happens to astronauts in space when they see Earth as a tiny, fragile ball of life. National boundaries vanish and the reality that we are all passengers on the planet becomes strikingly evident.

Designer Celine Semaan Vernon explores this concept in a collection of silk scarves that feature NASA images of the Earth and space taken by satellites and telescopes. Her company, Slow Factory, was founded on August 5, 2012, the day that the Curiosity rover landed on Mars.

Based in Brooklyn, N.Y., the fashion house merges the traditional functions of a design studio with a high-tech materials lab and the application of open source data. Limited-edition fashion pieces are created by printing high-resolution NASA satellite images on environmentally responsible fibers like silk and modal. The supply chain is 100 percent clean and fair trade.

For the spring/summer 2016 collection, Slow Factory is partnering with American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA) to raise awareness about the refugee crisis in Lebanon. Ten percent of the proceeds from the collection will provide vocational training to refugees. For more, visit www.slowfactory.com