Fifty years in, and Oakley still refuses to sit still. While most brands might throw a retrospective, Oakley cracked open its headquarters and let the future spill out. After debuting the Ellipse limited edition frames, Oakley kept the energy high for its 50th anniversary.
At its Interplanetary HQ in Foothill Ranch, California, the brand that turned sport optics into cultural currency celebrated its anniversary with a special reboot event. Across five days, guests stepped inside the labs, archives, and mindsets that have shaped Oakley’s path, from a BMX-obsessed garage project in 1975 to a global force now gearing up to land on the Moon.
“For us, the legacy is just the beginning,” says Brian Takumi, VP of Brand Soul and Creative. “Fifty years from now, are people going to be talking about what Oakley did in 2025 or just what we did in 1975? If we’re only recycling the past, we haven’t done our job.”
Inside the sprawling campus, guests were led through Oakley’s past, present, and speculative future, from high-tech labs and custom-built exhibits to rare views of the factory floor. Takumi, who’s been with the brand for nearly three decades, described it as “a whole generational life cycle. What’s considered retro now — Y2K graphics, the flame shirts, Medusa — it’s surreal. That was my work. I was designing those pieces back in the day.”
The limited-edition MUZM 2.0 program dives into Oakley’s history by re-releasing classic silhouettes, not as replicas, but reimagined with modern technology. Nearby, the Innovation and Tech expos offer a glimpse at the next chapter: helmet systems like Velo Mach and Velo Kato, and new entries including Stunt Wing and Stunt Devil, born from the same engineering-first philosophy that has always driven the brand.
That forward focus is especially clear in the Oakley x Axiom Space partnership, revealed during the anniversary event. Together, the two are building a visor system for NASA’s upcoming Artemis III lunar mission. Oakley’s High Definition Optics will be integrated into the AxEMU spacesuit, ensuring astronaut safety and visibility on the Moon. “The next person to walk on the Moon will be wearing Oakley,” says Takumi. “That’s not a metaphor. It’s real. It’s happening.”
Designed for one of the harshest environments imaginable, the AxEMU visor system features a stowable two-part structure, multilayer coatings, and a gold-reflective finish to guard against extreme solar exposure. It also reduces haze, blocks harmful radiation, and protects astronauts from lunar dust.
“In space, the sun is really harsh. It feels like it’s piercing through your eyes,” explains astronaut and Axiom Space CTO Koichi Wakata. “That’s why we need an exceptional visor system to protect [our] eyes and [offer] maximum visibility to enable [astronauts] to work in the challenging lunar environment.”
Russell Ralston, EVP of Extravehicular Activity at Axiom Space, adds: “With decades of pioneering expertise in optical innovation, Oakley will bring exceptional value to the design of our spacesuit. The unique collaboration exemplifies Axiom Space’s commitment to revolutionising spacesuit development through innovative industry partnerships around the world.”
While Oakley’s design language has always been linked to speed and sport, the brand is now extending that ethos into AI-enhanced wearables. At the Meta Experience zone, guests trial Oakley’s latest Performance AI glasses — the Meta HSTN — built to integrate style, functionality and responsive tech in real time.
Even more ambitious is Oakley’s approach to long-term vision-building, which Takumi describes as brand fiction and speculative futures — tools not just for storytelling, but for guiding product design. “Everything we do now, I ask: will it feel like it came from the same world as Max Fearlight?” he explains, referring to the animated campaign character first introduced in 1992. “That film shaped everything we made for twenty years after. Now, with Maxine Fearlight, we’re writing the next chapters.”
Part of what makes Oakley’s creative input so enduring, Takumi says, is the internal discipline to stay independent of trend cycles. “We’re trend aware, but not trend following. You’ve got to know what’s going on, sure, but our job is to respond to it in our own way, or reject it entirely.” Case in point: the 1998 Flesh shoe. “There was nothing like it at the time,” he says. “And now? People are still discovering it. That’s how you know it worked.”
To help future generations inside Oakley stay aligned, Takumi authored what he calls the brand’s “secret recipe” — a framework to preserve the core philosophy even after he’s gone. “You can’t leave it to tribal knowledge,” he says. “You can’t just tell people ‘ask Brian if it feels brand right.’ You have to put pen to paper. I did that about three years ago, and our founder Jim [Jannard] called me after reading it. He said, ‘You finally did it. You wrote down what Oakley is.’”
As for what’s next? Expect more provocation. The Meta Experience showcases Oakley’s new AI wearables: glasses that fuse performance with predictive tech. And the Future Genesis concept, led by the debut of Maxine Fearlight, reframes the brand’s design language for a generation raised on simulation, speed, and speculation — as well as rebooting Oakley’s original antihero, Max Fearlight. Where the original represented ‘90s futurism and untamed performance, Maxine represents what’s next: unafraid, unapologetic, and geared for a world where tech and identity blur.
“The best way to honour the past is to create something so bold that people will look back in twenty years and say, ‘That was the moment everything changed,’” says Takumi. “We think our legacy is going to be in reinventing optics, not just sunglasses styles that look some way, and that’s where I would hope in 2075 we’re talking about how Oakley reinvented what eyewear even means.”
Which, in Oakley terms, could only ever mean one thing: the future has already begun.
photography. Courtesy of Oakley
words. Gennaro Costanzo
