car design


REPORT: Honda closing European design office in Germany

The car design community has been sent reeling by word that Honda plans to close down its European design studio. The office forms part of Honda R&D Europe in Offenbach on the outskirts of Frankfurt, Germany, and while the rest of the research and development facility will continue operating in other capacities, the design studio is reportedly being axed. The two-floor, 3000-square-meter design studio at Offenbach opened its doors in 1992, and has since handled a variety of automotive and motorcycle design duties for the Japanese ... Read more →

REPORT: 'Personality traits' of automobiles studied Dan Roth

The styling of your vehicle makes a statement, of course. Designers spend years perfecting the craft of automotive sculpture, and are finely attuned to what types of shapes and conventions send ...

Peter Horbury returns to head Volvo design; Moray Callum in as Ford's design chief Chris Paukert

Peter Horbury is returning to finish what he started. The charismatic British designer is shifting from leading Ford's American design efforts back to Volvo, the Swedish automaker at which he helped ...

BREAKING: Volvo design chief Steve Mattin leaves company Chris Paukert

Details are scarce at the moment, but we have learned that Volvo's award-winning design director, Steve Mattin, has left the company. While no further details are immediately available (why he left, ...

Coco's Ride: What if Chanel designed automobiles? Jonathon Ramsey

Jinyoung Jo is a car designer at Hong-ik University in South Korea, and this is her creation: the Chanel Fiole concept. As with classic Coco Chanel work, the design of the car was centered on ...

Industry crunch hitting design students hard 11 months ago on Autoblog

Another casualty in the collateral damage of auto industry woes: Graduating car designers are no longer finding jobs. The LA Times reports that in years past, manufacturer representatives would attend the Pasadena's Art Center College of Design's senior showcase and welcome a few visionaries into ...

More details on VW's design renaissance 1 year ago on Autoblog

It seems Volkswagen has breathed a collective "Oops!", and is now working to turn its design ship around. VW was known for neat, differentiated designs with great interior details. While this stayed true in some parts of the world, in the U.S., Volkswagen design turned into chrome shield grilles ...

Buick Reatta a design flop? 1 year ago on Autoblog

The Buick Reatta a design flop? That's what a University of Michigan professor told The Wall Street Journal recently. Really? The Reatta is the one car that he could find to pick on as an automotive design flop? Sure, the high-tech coupe was overweight and underpowered, overpriced and ...

Nissan 360: the design future, and the new 370Z? 1 year ago on Autoblog

Click the image above for more hi-res shots of the 370Z and Infiniti design teasers. There were crisp images of a blurry car being swapped and discussed today at Nissan 360. When Shiro Nakamura, the head designer at Nissan, revealed the barest hints of a car outline hidden behind a taut sheet of ...

Bugatti Type 12-2 Streamliner design concept adds extra set of seats 1 year ago on Autoblog

Click above to view high-res gallery of renderings A few months ago, we wrote about an amateur designer who penned today's vision of a Bugatti Royale. It was all good at the front, and then things got a bit, well, funky at the rear. Now another car designing buff with a pen suite of software has ...

Lexus looking for successor to L-Finesse design 1 year ago on Autoblog

Click above for a high-res gallery of the Lexus LF-A roadster concept. Lexus' L-finesse design language was meant to stand for "Seamless Anticipation," "Intriguing Elegance," and "Incisive Simplicity." If we put aside the marketing speak for a moment, the point of L-f was to give Lexus design a ...

Ford already thinking about more aerodynamic F-150 1 year ago on Autoblog

click above for more high-res pics of the 2009 Ford F-150 The Ford F-150 is America's annual best seller, moving more units than anything else since Jimmy Carter was president. It's also one of the most challenged when it comes to cutting through the air, although we know there's worse. If the ...

Jaguar and Land Rover to build coolest design studio on Earth 1 year ago on Autoblog

Even though Jaguar and Land Rover might only have a foot or so of visibility into the fog of their business futures, they continue to plan for long-term success. The latest step is a $4 million investment in a "virtual reality center" that will create three-dimensional projections for designers and ...

Become a car designer, just $19.99! 1 year ago on Autoblog

From time to time we've all been tempted to purchase that fake diploma from the endlessly circulating email, right? The last time I checked, though, they weren't offering fake certificates from the Art Center College of Design, or the Academy of Art University. If you still held onto the dream of ...

Imagine that... good design sells in the mid-size category 2 years ago on Autoblog

The Chrysler 300 is an overwhelming success for Chrysler. Ford's Five Hundred wasn't nearly as big a hit despite on paper being a strong competitor. The Chrysler's advantage, of course, is bold design. The 300 has it, the Ford not so much. Automotive News even quotes an unnamed Ford exec saying the ...

Designers to Ferrari: we will have a Dino with or without you! 2 years ago on Autoblog

So many designers are getting in on Dino action these days, we can only hope the car doesn't turn into the automotive equivalent of Snakes on a Plane. Ferrari's consistent disavowals regarding any plans to make "a cheap Ferrari" is not stopping those with pens and intricate rendering software ...

Amateur car design: How fast do your dreams go? 2 years ago on Autoblog

I was young when I set up my first automotive company. It was small, as you might expect of a corporation founded by a 14-year-old. CJT Inc. produced only two vehicles. The MF2000 was a super-swoopy, gullwinged sports car with a tri-turbo V-12 that ran on either hydrogen or unleaded. Our other ...

Learn the language of car designers 2 years ago on Autoblog

At one of the Hot Rod Power Tour stops a few years ago, I met a GM designer at the automaker's booth. I can't recall his name, but I was so starstruck I think I remember our conversation consisting mostly of me saying, "Hey, you're cool." Don't let this happen to you. The New York Times provides a ...

GM shuffles global design team 2 years ago on Autoblog

GM's made some fairly significant changes to its domestic and international design teams, with former Chrysler designer Bryan Nesbitt coming out pretty good. Nesbitt moves from executive director of design for GM Europe to vice president of design for North America, reporting directly to Ed Welburn, ...

Land Rover designer quits, says no more 2 years ago on Autoblog

Geoff Upex worked with Land Rover for 23 years to help create and re-create the company's iconic boxy Range Rover line and in August, he relinquished the helm to Gerry McGovern. This week, Upex took his retirement on step further, saying that after his last day on Dec. 25, never again will he ...

Pencils ready? Peugeot announces 2007 Design Contest 3 years ago on Autoblog

Peugeot is launching the fourth edition of its worldwide design contest. The winning entrant will get to see his or her design turned into a full-sized model which will be displayed at the 2007 Frankfurt Motor Show. (Last year's winner - the Peugeot Moovie - is shown above.) In a new feature for ...

Daedalus concept re-imagines the family car 3 years ago on Autoblog

The Royal College of Art's 2006 award for Best Overall Concept Car has been won by 24 year-old Jonathan Punter, for his Daedalus family car. The radical concept also captured the Best Design Interpretation Award. In the catalog for the RCA's annual Summer Show, Punter describes the approach to ...

Caddy draws on history for richer interior in the 2007 SRX - UPDATED 3 years ago on Autoblog

Cadillac is borrowing a page out of its own book -- one written decades ago -- to offer consumers an interior in the 2007 Cadillac SRX that's hand-crafted by GM's finest. The luxury crossover offers up a richer cabin thanks to what GM calls its "cut and sew" method, a manual manufacturing process ...

GM Makes-A-Wish come true for teen with leukemia 3 years ago on Autoblog

General Motors recently gave Aaron Robinson, a junior at the Charter High School for Architecture and Design in Philadelphia, an unforgettable gift. The creative 17-year-old has a love for designing automobiles, so in conjunction with the Make-A-Wish foundation GM designers transformed his sketches ...

Audi's next A4 to get edgy 3 years ago on Autoblog

Wheels24 has produced a sketch of what it believes the next Audi A4 will look like based on insider info and analysis of recent Audi design trends. The A4's face appears much more aggressive the the current model's, with headlights angled down towards the large grille and similar LED light bars to ...

GM seeks next great car designer in Detroit high schools 3 years ago on Autoblog

In March General Motors partnered with the College for Creative Studies and began visiting 15 Detroit area public high schools to seek out and encourage the next generation of car designers coming up the ranks. Seasoned car designers from GM's Design Center and students from CSS provided instruction ...

Atari challenges gamers to design their perfect car 3 years ago on Autoblog

Legendary video game firm Atari is celebrating its latest driving simulator with its 'Test Drive Unlimited - Be a Car Designer' sweepstakes. The contest challenges car buffs, gamers, designers and artists to create their own dream car. The prize? The winner will receive $2,500, and their design ...

Fantastic plastic sparks freaky future designs 3 years ago on Autoblog

Here at Autoblog we are flat-out fascinated by concept cars, the wilder the better. The design shown above is one of the award winners in the Royal College of Art's recent "PLASTicon" project, sponsored by GE Plastics (the creators of lexan and other wonder materials). As you might expect, the ...

Pininfarina seeing red - again 3 years ago on Autoblog

Iconic Italian design house Pininfarina is seeing red -- and it isn't the paint on one of its Ferrari concepts. The firm announced that it lost 8.1 million euros last year (that's $9.72M USD)... a frightening 238-percent increase over its 2004 losses. Pininfarina estimates its production value ...

Nissan design chief argues GM has forgotten its customers 3 years ago on Autoblog

Shiro Nakamura, a senior vice president for Nissan Motor Co. and design chief for the automaker, believes that General Motors has been suffering from a lack of awareness when it comes to consumers' needs:  "there was a lack of customer-orientation." And arguably, he should know: ...

Car designers pick Sexiest Car Alive 3 years ago on Autoblog

While many organizations have claimed this vehicle or that one as the most beautiful car in the world, the most recent being the International Automotive Festival crowning the Alfa Brera the sexiest sled alive, few can claim the legitimacy of this one. Car Design News, a website produced ...

The K-factor: Hyundai's secret design weapon 3 years ago on Autoblog

Hyundai has been the talk of the town in recent years as it continues to grab market share from the industry’s established players. Many have credited the Korean automaker’s successful shaking of its shoddy image through an aggressive quality campaign spearheaded by the largest warranty ...

Ford designers dumping clay for computers 3 years ago on Autoblog

Computers have aided in the design of cars for decades now and each passing year sees the big beige boxes becoming a more important design tool than the pencil itself. Ford is on the cutting edge of computer aided design with a new software system called Bunkspeed that allows a design to go straight ...






Autoblog Podcast #153: With Phil Berg

Phil Berg puts his reputation on the line and hangs with the podcast crew.

 
 

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