Mission insignia patch on the spacesuit worn by Dave Scott during the Apollo 15 lunar landing in July 1971. On display at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

Fashion designer Emilio Pucci was asked to design the patch. Scott was the one who approached him. Pucci came up with the idea of three highly stylized "birds" in blue and green on a square patch. The crew changed the shape to round and the colors to red, white, and blue. (White represented Worden, blue represented Scott, and red represented Irwin.) The patch shows the three arcs over a photograph of Hadley Rille -- the section of the moon where Apollo 15 was to land. The shadows of the craters just to the center-right of the stylized birds form the Roman numeral XV. (NASA insisted that the mission number be displayed.)

The dust you see on the suit is moondust.

Apollo 15 was fourth manned mission to the Moon. It was designed to last a lot longer than previous stays on the Moon, so that additional scientific experiments could be conducted. The mission began on July 26, 1971, and concluded on August 7.

Commander David Scott and Lunar Module Pilot James Irwin landed the Lunar Module "Falcon" on the Moon, and spent three days there. This included 18.5 hours outside the LM. This was the first mission to not land on a "mare" (the so-called "lunar seas", or flat and smooth plains of basaltic lava). Instead, Apollo 15 landed near Hadley rille near Palus Putredinus (the Marsh of Decay). The crew explored the area using the Lunar Rover. Pilot Alfred Worden flew the Command Module "Endeavor" in orbit above the Moon, conducting numerous science experiments and even deploying a satellite in lunar orbit.

The spacesuit worn on Apollo 15 was a new design. Previous Apollo flights featured a suit with the life support, cooling, and communications connections in front in two parallel rows of three. The Apollo 15 "A7L-B" suit, however, placed these in triangular pairs. The zipper was also redesigned. The old zipper went up-and-down. But the new zipper went from the right shoulder to the left hip, and included a waist joint. This meant the astronauts could actually bend over for the first time, and sit on the Lunar Rover. Upgraded backpacks also permitted more time spent outside the LM.