Space architecture is the theory and practice of designing and building inhabited environments in outer space. This mission statement for space architecture was developed in 2002 by participants in the 1st Space Architecture Symposium, organized at the World Space Congress in Houston, by the Aerospace Architecture Subcommittee, Design Engineering Technical Committee (DETC), American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).
The subcommittee rose to the status of an independent Space Architecture Technical Committee (SATC) of the AIAA in 2008. The SATC routinely organizes technical sessions at several conferences, including AIAA ASCEND, the International Conference on Environmental Systems (ICES), the International Astronautical Congress (IAC), and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Earth & Space conference.