The definition of space colonization is to “live, work, and play in space” for a comfortably long period. And eventually, part of this experience for some lucky people will be to start their married lives together in space. “Eventually” may not be too much longer according to the UK’s Daily Mail who reported last month that Sir Richard Branson, the billionaire boss of Virgin Galactic, plans to be the first person to marry a couple in space. The happy couple is on the first flight sometime in 2009.

Virgin Galactic’s cost per person is $ 200,000. Reportedly 200 people have already reserved seats on the two-hour suborbital flights that peak 70 miles up (officially in space) and experience a black, twinkle-free, star-filled sky, and a brief zero-g experience. Physicist Steven Hawking and actress Victoria Principal are booked (not to get married, by the way!). This is definitely early “ebullient” behavior signaling our approach to the 2015 Maslow Window (See Perspectives Wave Guides 1 and 6), and will become even more compelling as more companies join the space tourism business and competition drives the prices down.

When the suborbital tourist business matures and prospers, you’ll be able to spend your honeymoon (first or second!) in an Earth-orbit hotel! The Shimizu Corporation proposed an innovative design in 1989.

The Shimizu Space Hotel concept spins around a 70 meter radius. .

Their concept features 0.7g artificial gravity using a 3 rpm hotel spin with 64 guest habitation modules. During the guests’ 2 day stays, part of the excitement will be deciding when to enjoy weightlessness and when to retreat to their suite for near-normal gravity! Shimizu’s 1989 cost study assumed 11,500 guests per year at the orbital hotel with a price of $ 43,500 per guest.

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