Table of contents for No. 242 in AUTO & DESIGN

“Just like a pair of comfortable and fashionable running shoes, we wanted our latest offering to immediately excite your urge to get out and about”, Takuyuki Nakajima, head of design for the fourth generation Yaris, explains, with a touch of irony. More than 20 years after the launch of the original version (dated 1999), the little Japanese car thus taps into an unprecedented dynamism, which is reflected in more modern surfaces that are strongly animated by their plasticity. “We were aiming to communicate an impression of great agility and fun in driving, making it compatible with the limited dimensions. We wanted to obtain a form that appeared on the point of shooting forward at any moment”. The project made use of the freedom accorded by the very new TNGA-B platform,…

“Disruptive projects are always the best ones to work on.” That is how Pierre Leclercq, the head of design at Citroën, described the Ami electric “urban mobility device.” The Ami is an adaptation of the Ami One concept shown at Geneva in 2019, taken from concept to production in one year. Among the “disruptive” elements that made it from the show floor to the factory are the Ami One’s symmetrical doors, with the driver’s side hinged at the rear and the passenger’s hinged at the front; interchangeable front and rear bumpers and lights, and petite size (2.4 meters long, so two can be parked in a standard space). “Electrification will come,” said Vincent Cobee, the CEO of Citroën. “But at what price? Will it be a limitation to individual mobility?”…

The earliest ideas on the way to design the fourth generation Audi A3 were based on a survey: “We asked our customers what features they wanted to continue to see and what improvements they were looking for after using the car for a number of years. While fully satisfied with the car as a whole, one demand stood out: more character”, says Marc Lichte, Audi design manager. Right from the very first sketches, the German hatchback was therefore designed to display as much sportiness as possible: “In formal terms, the three proposals from our style centres all had a rather dynamic disposition. In the end, the proposal from Ingolstadt was chosen, but the concepts that reached us from far away, such as the one from the Beijing studio, were also…

Cars and trains, worlds apart in terms of styling and design. Or maybe not. TMH, Russia’s biggest manufacturer of railway equipment, and one of the six largest companies in the sector in the world, has commissioned Italdesign to design the next generation of its locomotives for passenger, freight and underground trains. “The TMH brief was clear right from the start: to create styling cues that would be recognisable in the whole product line. Something similar to what happens in the automotive industry when you create a completely new style for a brand range. But here the challenge is perhaps even more interesting because the requirements are radically different for each product”, says Nicola Guelfo, head of Industrial Design at Italdesign. "Railways in Russia began to develop in the 19th century,…

The old and the new: the demographics of the car, Luc Donckerwolke maintains, is changing. Presenting the Prophecy concept, which in his intention represents an important change for the future, the head of design for the Hyundai Group (which comprises Kia and Genesis too) claims - in plain language - that the market in Europe, by way of an example, “is an old market”. In Korea, in contrast Donckerwolke lives “in a young market” which inevitably leaves a mark on his work. He insists: “Young people, so-called millennials, buy fewer cars because the market offers cars for old people. Many manufacturers still haven’t understood this. Countries like Korea, China, Japan, Indonesia, and India instead offer us a testing ground to see how we can respond to changes”. At the least,…

“More flexibility, more dynamism, more fun”. The electrification of models has triggered the imagination of designers of all ages who are grappling with a new management of forms and spaces. Robin Page, Senior Vice President of Design for Volvo Cars, puts it clearly: “Electrification allows us to re-plan the style of the car as it has been conceived up until today. The electric platforms allow us greater flexibility, which directly influences design”. The revolution affects every part of the vehicle’s architecture: “The absence of the front engine has direct effects on the front end of electric cars, which is often low and short, with significantly reduced overhangs. The latter feature also increases the load capacity of models, because it is possible to create a small space for stowing things below…

Celebrating 110 years of automotive history is no routine event, but when the Alfa Romeo design team sat down to think about how to celebrate it, they had no doubt about what they had to do: bring the GTA (Gran Turismo Alleggerita) badge back to life. “If we close our eyes and imagine what cars express all the values of the Alfa Romeo brand, the GTA versions of our models spring to mind. So to be able to use these legendary initials once again, we opted for the Giulia, a car that even in its production version stands out for its sporty shapes and sinuous surfaces”, says Klaus Busse, head of design for the FCA group in Europe. The Giulia GTA is the most extreme version of the Italian saloon.…

“A strong, sexy, and modern design”. Adrian van Hooydonk has no doubts: the Concept i4 is proof that, in terms of so-called “zero emissions mobility”, the Bavarian manufacturer has made itself the champion of “a new language with cleaner shapes”. The Concept i4 is the precursor of the i4 electric sedan, which will see the light next year, almost at the same time as the more conventional Series 4 sedan and alongside another electric vehicle, the i-NEXT Sport Activity Vehicle (SAV). Van Hooydonk, who is head of design for the whole group, worked hard with the head of design for the BMW brand, Domagoj Dukec, being convinced that “not only will electric mobility become part of the core of the BMW brand, but this formal language also will”. In other…

Set up in 2014, Manifattura Automobili Torino (MAT) has successfully carved out a space for itself on the world car scene by virtue of sporting successes and eye-catching projects like the New Stratos and the Aspark Owl. Its next step is to become a full-blown manufacturer. MAT had prepared this year’s Geneva Motor Show in great style and had counted on taking three outstanding projects to Switzerland. First, two examples of the New Stratos, a contemporary makeover of the celebrated Lancia sports car designed by Marcello Gandini for Bertone and now reinterpreted in a limited series of 25 units. Then, in collaboration with Officine Fioravanti, the idea was to show a restmod in Geneva based on the first Ferrari Testarossa series (the 1984 one): a restoration remaining faithful to the…

The success of a new automotive brand is never a given, but when technological features and good design meet, the challenge becomes even more interesting. While Aiways, the Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer, is preparing to launch its first zero emissions SUV, the U5, in Europe, it has already announced the arrival of a second model preceded by the U6ion concept car. To better satisfy the stylistic tastes of Europeans, Aiways entrusted the supervision of its own vehicles’ design to Ken Okuyama, past creative director for Pininfarina in the early 2000s and creator of many successful sports cars, including the Ferrari Enzo and the Maserati Quattroporte Mk V. “Work with the design team began by developing the basic lines of the Aiways products. They all need to express great technology, but…

Original research that evolves the concept of sustainable mobility and explores the future of transport. This is the Tracy, a vehicle with original forms developed by the twenty-one students of the Master in Transportation Design at the IED of Turin to investigate new modes of shared transport. “This year our focus was on research set free to transcend market constraints and allow our students to devote themselves to bold, pure experimentation. Unbound by the specific demands of any particular client, the overall design project was enhanced by many different stimuli. During the phases of reflecting on, processing and developing the concept, the young designers were, in fact, able to acquire competency and grasp opportunities in a series of classroom meetings. David Melvin Wilkie, Head of Design CNH Industrial Design, Guido…