World View is a capsule designed to take passengers on flights to the edge of space. Designed by Priestmangoode for the Paragon Space Development Corporation and inspired by the studio's work designing luxury aircraft interiors, World View focuses on enhancing comfort onboard the capsule to create a truly transformative human experience.

World View will spend between two and six hours at the intended altitude of 30 kilometres, and the length of time of the journey was a significant driver for the design of the vessel. This design was not about speed, but about enjoying a once in a lifetime experience.

The Paragon Space Development Corporation was working on a project to fly a capsule to over 30 kilometres in altitude by means of a helium balloon. They turned to Priestmangoode to design what the experience might look like.

The design needed to reflect key brand personality traits, including professional, safe, authentic and technically sound, as well as sophisticated, elegant, stylish, luxurious, fun/exciting and unique/amazing.

The project proved an exciting opportunity. Commercial space travel is a nascent industry and there is great scope for designing what these luxury experiences might look like.

One of the key aspects of World View was to design a luxurious environment that maximised the view as well as the comfort of the passenger for what would be a journey somewhere between two and six hours.

The idea of space travel naturally brings to mind traditional rocket ships and the aerodynamic forms they command, but World View was not about speed, it was about the experience. As a result, the stylish, elegant and luxurious environment has the perfect balance between form and function.

The capsule's sturdy form was designed to enhance passenger safety. The key design features are the large panoramic windows constructed from an array of small high pressure units.

Priestmangoode is the leading global travel and transport design consultancy. With a background in product design, we have over the last 15 years specialised in improving the passenger experience from home to destination, designing everything from airport shuttle trains, airport products and services, cabin interiors and airline branding, as well as hotels and cruise ships. As a result, we have a unique understanding of what the passenger wants and are able to transfer skills across industries.

We wanted the travel experience onboard World View to be as comfortable as possible for passengers and for staff, and are currently developing the interiors to be as lounge-like as possible to offer passengers a luxurious environment from which to experience this unique journey.

The project had to be turned around very quickly. Priestmangoode was given certain key requirements and our designs were based around those.

The capsule had to comfortably sit eight passengers, including two staff. It also needed to be as compact as possible.

We were able to draw on our extensive experience designing aircraft interiors to inform the design and ensure that it would be as lightweight as possible.

It was crucial to find a way of maximising the viewing windows. In our initial design meetings with the World View team, they talked about wanting to start the journey before dawn, so that as passengers rose up to the edge of space, they would be able to observer the sunrise, the curvature of the Earth, the thin blue atmosphere and the blackness of space. The windows we designed offer the maximum amount of viewing space for passengers, whilst meeting stringent safety requirements (as there was a limit to the size of the windows due to the amount of pressure they would need to withstand).

The Paragon Space Development Corporation is currently continuing their research and development of the World View capsule, with the first flights scheduled for in about three years' time.

World View will enable a wider group of people to experience space travel, at approximately a third of the price of other commercial space carriers.

The World View capsule is also equipped with a science capsule attached to the top of the exterior for potential scientific data readings.