Design

A landmark new history from design journalist Nick Hull, Land Rover Design – 70 years of Success offers a detailed insight to the company’s design story, from the early days of Land Rover in Solihull to the latest generation of the Range Rover Velar in 2018. The Land Rover was born from a desperate need by the Rover Company to develop a stop-gap model to provide cash flow in the post-war years. The original aim of a simple 4×4 agricultural tool soon developed into a multi-purpose vehicle that became the mainstay of the British Army and produced numerous offshoots for the emergency services, police, forestry and aid agencies worldwide.

A bespoke full-size clay model of the Jaguar I-PACE, created by the brand’s world-renowned designer Ian Callum, is to take center stage at Scotland’s first dedicated design museum. The I-PACE exhibit will be unveiled on 15 September at the grand opening of the new V&A Design Museum in Dundee, which highlights the global achievements of Scottish designers past and present. The clay model shows the painstaking and elaborate design process behind the firm’s first all-electric vehicle as well as the steps followed to create all new Jaguars.

Aston Martin Executive Vice President and Chief Creative Officer, Marek Reichman received the ‘Design Hero’ award at this year’s annual Autocar Awards. The much-anticipated awards, held at Silverstone Circuit, recognizes the automotive industry’s high achievers and celebrates the cars that have achieved top grading by the magazine’s road testers during the last 12 months.

For the sixth year running, the parent company of MG has launched the SAIC Design Challenge for automotive design students. Following the competition’s success in China, a European based competition has been launched now running for its second year. This year, students are being challenged to develop a flagship electric vehicle for the iconic MG Motor brand that will meet 2025 transport requirements. The technical level of entries that students are required to produce is very demanding, with future automotive designers producing fully-developed concepts. Last year, two European finalists were sent to China to present final designs at SAIC Motor’s global headquarters to the board and international members of the press.

Aston Martin EVP and Chief Creative Officer Marek Reichman has been appointed to the prestigious DESIGNBEST Hall of Fame. Voted by automotive journalists from over 30 European countries, Reichman has been described as one of the best car designers in the world, designing some of the most iconic Aston Martin models including the DB10, built exclusively for James Bond, the DB11, the latest in the illustrious DB bloodline and the new Vantage.

Aston Martin, the British luxury carmaker, today revealed it would be investing in a new design and innovation partnership with The College of Design and Innovation, Tongji University in Shanghai, one of the world’s leading universities for the study of design and innovation. Aston Martin’s EVP and Chief Creative Officer, Marek Reichman will become a visiting professor, sharing his knowledge with the students via lectures and workshops. The first project of this new partnership is a collaboration on designs for future color and trim projects.

Gerry McGovern, Land Rover Chief Design Officer, was last night named Designer of the Year at the Festival Automobile International. The Grand Prix du Design prize recognizes McGovern’s Land Rover designs and their influence across the car industry.

Jaguar has created a unique film, Blacklight, to celebrate the 70 awards won globally by the F-PACE performance SUV. The practical British-built performance family car counts the World Car of the Year 2017 and World Car Design of the Year 2017 titles among its 70 awards. Jaguar has celebrated this success with a unique film that dramatically captures F-PACE’s acclaimed exterior design and state-of-the-art engineering.

McLaren Special Operations, the bespoke division of McLaren Automotive, has delved deep into the company’s heritage to create a unique color with a family story attached. Muriwai refers to different episodes of the McLaren story: it is the name of the New Zealand coastal community where McLaren founder Bruce McLaren won his first motor race; it is also the name he gave to his family house in Surrey, England and it is now the name of a new special paint colour in the MSO catalogue for the recently launched 570S Spider. Inspired by the whitewashed walls, deep blue doors, and shutters of the handsome McLaren homestead, Muriwai White paint is white with blue flecks. The color was developed by McLaren Special Operations, Amanda McLaren, Bruce’s only child and a brand ambassador for McLaren Automotive and McLaren paint Partner AkzoNobel. Amanda […]

In this short video, Ian Callum, Design Director of Jaguar UK, discusses the birth of the design elements in the new E-PACE. From the cub-like large paws and eyes to the camera inspired tactile dials, the car is designed for its enjoyable aesthetic appeal. There are even racing chicane inspired flourishes captured in the dash and taillights. Design creates order out of chaos. But chaos is often required to simply be creative. — Ian Callum, Jaguar Cars Design Director The Jaguar E-PACE is a compact sport utility vehicle (compact SUV) that was officially revealed on 13 July 2017. In a break from tradition, the car is to be built in Graz, Austria, by Magna Steyr and by Chery Jaguar Land Rover, JLR’s joint venture with partner Chery in Changshu, China. The E-Pace will be the first of Jaguar’s cars to […]

The launch of the MG ZS marks an exciting new era of design for the iconic brand, representing a major step-change and commitment to a new global MG design philosophy. Based on ‘Emotional Dynamism’, the MG ZS embodies a more expressive design language that emphasizes the premium experience and commitment to quality of the ambitious brand. With a look that brings together the three key elements of ‘Emotional’, ‘Humanised’ and ‘Agility’, the MG ZS represents a desirable, accessible and dynamic approach to affordable motoring. One of the key design features of the MG ZS is the compelling new face of MG, which features an enlarged, full frame grille, inspired by the famous brand’s heritage, but executed in a contemporary way. It allows for a much bigger MG badge to take center stage and showcase pride in the brand. This confident […]

The launch of MG’s new Compact-SUV marks an exciting new era of design for the iconic company. The brand-new Compact-SUV is set to go on sale later this Autumn, representing a major step-change for MG. The new MG design philosophy is based on ‘Emotional Dynamism’, which represents a more expressive design language that emphasizes the premium nature of MG’s latest model. The contemporary look harmoniously brings together the three key elements of ‘Emotional’, ‘Humanised’ and ‘Agility’ that accentuate the car’s desirability, accessibility, and dynamic stance.

Jaguar’s new E-PACE performance SUV plays in the city in a series of ‘warped reality’ pictures by digital artist Chris Labrooy. The artwork celebrates the North American launch of Jaguar’s new compact performance SUV. Inspired by the car’s playful character and its record-breaking barrel-roll reveal, Labrooy puts the E-PACE into a series of unlikely locations and scenarios. The ‘Transposition’ series of images revealed today features Detroit, famed for its automotive heritage and the location of the E-PACE’s US debut today.

Note: We published an announcement of this A Life in Car Design – Jaguar, Lotus, TVR by Oliver Winterbottom last month, and now our friend John Clancy has contributed this review. In my opinion, the wedge era of the 1970s and 80s was the high point of automotive styling.  In particular, it was the sports cars from that period that really cut the mustard.  Among the British entries into the market, there was one man who was behind more sports car styles than anyone else, Oliver Winterbottom.  This is the autobiography of his career.  From his apprenticeship with William Lyons’ Jaguar in 1961, working for Colin Chapman at Lotus, TVR, General Motors and his period as a consultant in China, this book gives an insight into what it took to get his designs into production [or not] with an authority that can only be relayed […]

Back to the more modern works! Our video this week comes via Aston Martin and, although really an advertising piece, is a stylish depiction of beauty as seen through the eyes of Aston Martin and their designers. If you like the Aston Martin Valkyrie or the Zagato then you will love this video. The Vulcan, launched in 2015 as a track-only limited edition car, was designed by Aston Martin’s creative officer Marek Reichman. The car is limited to 24 examples worldwide. The Zagato was unveiled in 2011 and awarded the “Design Award for Concept Cars and Prototypes” at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este where it made its debut. The car was designed at the Aston Martin Design Studios in Gaydon. The beautiful Zagato was produced in collaboration with Zagato to celebrate a fifty-year partnership between the two companies.

McLaren Automotive has announced the promotion of Rob Melville to Design Director with immediate effect. He reports to Chief Operating Officer, Dr. Jens Ludmann. Rob joined McLaren Automotive in 2009 as Senior Designer, rising to Chief Designer in 2014. During his time at McLaren, Rob has worked on the McLaren P1™, the evolution of the 12C into the 650S, the 675LT, and was responsible for the Sports Series which won the ‘Best of the Best’ category in the coveted Red Dot design awards in 2016. Most recently he led the design of the 720S, the first model in the second-generation Super Series.

Giovanni Michelotti was a prolific designer, who styled cars for Ferrari, Maserati, BMW and Triumph, designing some of the latter’s most successful cars in the postwar era. When you look at a Triumph TR4, Spitfire, Stag or Herald, you are looking at Michelotti’s work. Giovanni Michelotti will be inducted into the British Sports Car Hall of Fame on June 2, 2017.

Sir William Lyons was the founder, director, chairman and guiding force of Jaguar. That seems like such a short and simple sentence to convey the importance of the man known as “Mister Jaguar”. For over 40 years Lyons led the car company through its many iterations and shaped both the cars and the culture through personal determination. For those many years, Lyons simply was Jaguar. He will be inducted into the British Sports Car Hall of Fame in just over two weeks.