Iconic ‘Star Trek’ Costumes and Props Beam Into London’s Science Museum

In celebration of 60 years of , London’s Science Museum has partnered with the long-running franchise to open a free display of archival objects.

The show, “Star Trek Warp Trail,” which opened on March 26 and runs through September, goes beyond props to look at the connections between science fiction and innovations in the modern world.

In the costume department, there’s the uniform belonging to Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott, worn by Simon Pegg in the 2009 version of the command uniform worn by U.S.S. Enterprise captain Christopher Pike, played by Anson Mount in (2022); and admiral Jean-Luc Picard’s uniform worn by Patrick Stewart in . In the case of a suit worn by Sonequa Martin-Green’s captain Michael Burnham, the design took inspiration from real spacesuits that enable wearers to survive in the vacuum of space.

The display begins with a model of U.S.S. Enterprise from and continues with the prototype android B-4 prop head found by Lieutenant Commander Data, played by Brent Spiner, in (2002). At a time when A.I. assistants are commonplace, the prop offers questions about the future of such technologies.

Such prescience runs through the franchise. Trekkies were already familiar with the idea of portable communication devices when mobile phones first began appearing in the 1970s. As the museum notes, Motorola’s clamshell flip phone from the late 1990s was clearly influenced by the franchise. Its name, after all, was StarTAC. This linkage is on show through the display of personal access display devices, communicators, and combadges from throughout the universe.

The display also looks at how the franchise offers long-distance interstellar flight, a journey only recently begun by homo sapiens with NASA spacecraft Voyagers 1 and 2 which entered interstellar space in 2012 and 2018, respectively. What will future space exploration look like? A photon collection from (1986) and a spore canister from (2017–24) beg the question. Elsewhere, there’s equipment used by doctors in the franchise, such as scan patients and hyposprays, with the museum pointing out how these fictional instruments have real-world parallels.

The initiative also has cinematic and collecting components. In what has been labeled a world-first, visitors can watch all 13films at the Science Museum’s IMAX theatre in screenings that will run through mid-June. A specially set up gift store will sell exclusive merchandise including coins, t-shirts, tote bags, posters, and sew-on patches.

“ as a cultural phenomenon has played a real role in changing the world of STEM, from inspiring technical innovations to encouraging a generation of modern astronauts,” the museum’s head of collections, Glyn Morgan, said in a statement. “I hope that this programme at the Science Museum inspires visitors to consider what might be possible if you boldly go where no one has gone before.”