Table of contents for No. 221 in AUTO & DESIGN

For decades they accompanied families along the road to social, economic and technical evolution, in Italy and in Europe as a whole: compact Fiat models proved that they, more than other cars, were a reliable choice for so many young professionals and fathers looking for a concrete, spacious product that is able to communicate both modernity and stylistic appeal. Those were the years of the 128, the Ritmo and the first Tipo, excellent everyday small cars which for many years constituted a certainty for Italians and a thorn in the competition’s side. “In a way, the spirit of the new Tipo family represents a return to those years,” said an enthusiastic Andreas Wuppinger, the head of interior design at FCA for the EMEA region. “While many car makers today think…

“It is the link between an SUV and a station wagon.” This is how Thomas Ingenlath, Senior Vice President Design at Volvo Cars, described the new V90 Cross Country, the model that completes the family of larger cars from the Swedish carmaker built on the SPA (Scalable Product Architecture) platform, which also includes the XC90, S90 and V90. However, for Volvo it is not just another version, but the fourth generation of a model with a history of its own, which began almost twenty years ago with the V70 XC that was launched in 1997. It is a car that has had numerous followers – one example will suffice, the Audi Allroad, introduced in 2000 – thanks to its formula of a station wagon with a raised ride height, strengthened…

For DS this is the moment of a historic new departure in the name of a philosophy that blends comfort, luxury and pioneering spirit and which is rooted in the DS19 of 1955. Following the first “tailor-made” car (“commande spéciale” is the correct definition) prepared for an anonymous Parisian lady – Madame L – and displayed at the Paris Show, and following the start up of Only You, a complex set of customer assistance services, the French manufacturer has closed the first stage of life without Citroën with the DS3, DS4 and DS5. Now it is preparing for the second generation of DS products – the first will be a Suv, probably in 2017 – with the specific intention, as Thierry Métroz says, “of developing the rather magical alchemy between…

Gautam Sen MARCELLO GANDINI, MAESTRO OF DESIGN Dalton Watson Fine Books Ed. Two volumes bursting with content telling the story centred around one of the world’s greatest designers, Marcello Gandini, artfully penned by Gautam Sen, the Indian journalist and writer renowned as the founder of India’s first car magazine, Indian Auto, in 1986, and Auto India in 1993. As the author explains, this is by no means intended to be a biography of Gandini himself, but a detailed account of the cars designed by him and of his career – indeed, if there’s one thing that everyone knows about Gandini, it is his extraordinary modesty and his disinterest in being a public figure. This was one of the reasons why it was so difficult to piece together the different aspects…

It’s a literally electrifying moment for design. If hybrid engines – more and more popular with the public – had already in part offered an opportunity to modify vehicle architecture, new concepts and packages are being born with pure electric drive. And new identities too as we saw at the last Paris Show, a veritable celebration of the electric car. The exterior features change according to changing technical demands and the desire to communicate that we are in the presence of a zero-emission power unit, but the most significant transformation is the cabin which can finally free up space. The already highly digitally oriented interface becomes even more immaterial as new modes of information display and interaction with on board controls are tested. In particular, the dashboard as we know…

When Volkswagen announced it was moving into the electric age it may have sounded a bit opportunistic, a way of reacting to its dieselgate troubles. But the I.D. concept, which stole the Paris show, made even most pessimists turn 180 degrees positive when they saw one of the Show’s most innovative initiatives. Radically new in design, it is based on an all-new modular platform with propulsion for the next decade. VW’s lean and almost simplistic looking I.D. showed us a future which has been the talk of the town for some years now. How did they do it, in less than a year since the company decided to create its dedicated MEB (Modularer Elektrobaukasten) platform? Development commenced shortly after the diesel-related troubles came to light. “In mid-2015 we had already…

“The fact that this car doesn’t fit an internal combustion engine had to show in the design too”. This is how Robert Lesnik, head of Mercedes exteriors, explains his styling decisions in preparing Generation EQ, the concept that the German manufacturer presented in Paris and that previews by a couple of years the first production Mercedes designed for electric traction, indeed the first of an entire EQ branded family. Dimensions are more or less those of the Suv GLC Coupé but on a completely new modular platform that can be adapted to other types of car and that accommodates the big batteries and two motors (one per axle) delivering 300 kW for a range of 500 kilometres. “It is a very clean crossover without sharp edges, like an aircraft, very…

Family cars don’t have to be boring. Or so Gerry McGovern says. We met him in Paris for the launch of the Discovery and he ran us through all the fundamental steps in the creative process. Built on the full-size platform of Land Rover Suv’s – the same that the Range Rover and Range Rover Sport are based on – it can offer seven “real” seats in a premium cabin whose total length is a little less than 5 metres. “The wheelbase has grown and the vehicle has become a bit bigger but it actually looks even more compact”, McGovern says. “When defining the Discovery we first looked for a kind of universal appeal that was still highly distinctive and much more sophisticated in terms of design. A much different,…

A pageant of dream cars, the involvement of some of the world’s leading automotive design professionals, a friendly atmosphere that encourages dialogue, and efficient, punctilious organisation – these are the key ingredients of the Autostyle Design Competition, the event dedicated to car design, now in its thirteenth edition, organised with passion by Berman and its chairman Roberto Artioli in collaboration with Auto&Design and Wacom. This year’s iteration of the competition dedicated to students was also a success. In keeping with the traditions of the event, many of the proposals presented addressed the topic of car customisation. Of the twelve finalists selected by the panel, Kaihang Huang, a Chinese student of the IED institute in Turin, came first in both the “Urban cars/Crossover” and “Sport cars” categories, while the “Audience Award”…

It claims to be “the most connected car in the world”, it was designed and engineered in Sweden and it will be built in China where it will go on sale from next year before arriving in Europe and the United States in 2018. We are talking about the 01, the first car to be spawned by Lynk & Co, the new brand launched by Geely Auto Group which thus builds on its acquisition of Volvo in 2010. In fact the Chinese group, together with the Swedish engineers, have developed the new CMA (Compact Modular Architecture) platform which will provide the base for Lynk & Co. vehicles and the Volvo Series 40, starting with the XC40 crossover. So first out of the box is the 01, a medium segment Suv…

“It all started from a sketch, almost as if we had not planned it,” said Alexandre Malval, head of design at Citroën, standing next to the silhouette of this saloon which does not transcend the elegance of its 1.38 metres in height. “The rear view is that of a large five door coupé, very tapered and very innovative, which one of our best designers, Grégory Blanchet, created for his own enjoyment, after having signed off the Aircross prototype in 2015.” Frédéric Duvernier, who is in charge of concept cars, agreed: “Everyone liked Grégory’s sketch, and everyone felt that it was an idea worth developing. And so the CXperience was born.” But if the lines of the tail end, stripped of certain excesses (“they were too sporty and too sleek, and…

The Optima family is now complete, ready to take up arms to give Kia “a quality label as well as one of substance”, as Gregory Guillaume, creator and builder of this vehicle under the leadership of design chief Peter Schreyer, says. “This car”, he says, “with all its components has to put across to customers the idea of quality that we now feel to be part of us but which up to the present has never been associated with our brand. We have to surprise the public, and the models we have coming out over the next two years will certainly do that”. The saloon has been on the market for nearly a year and now the Optima GT takes its bow at the Paris Show with its powerful turbo…

What if living in a city where urban transport was more attentive to the needs of its users were not just a Utopian dream but a not-too-distant reality? This was the question inspiring the project conducted in collaboration between Seat and the students of the Undergraduate Degree in Transportation Design held by IED in Barcelona. The brief assigned to the students by the design department of the Spanish brand was: identify the real needs of users and define vehicles and devices which will respond to these needs and improve mobility in the city of 2035. As Jesus Iglesias, professor in Transportation at IED and Seat designer, explained, the project was first presented to the students at Seat’s Barcelona headquarters design centre, after which the initial stage in the project began,…