Autoblog

What A Body!

Some years back I got to meet Giorgietto Giugiaro, the ultra-famous Italian car designer. "Gosh," I gushed, "you certainly are a visionary. Twenty years ago you said that the one-box design would become the dominant body style in the future. And you were right."

"No, you're wrong," he corrected me matter of factly, "I said that thirty years ago."

Giugiaro knew that getting the "mostest with the leastest" is the greatest challenge a designer faces. And he knew that a one-box design provides the greatest amount of interior room with the smallest exterior package. So, he openly declared that in the future more and more cars would adopt one-box designs.

A quick tutorial here for the uninitiated in designer lingo. A one-box design is just what it implies, a box on wheels, like a cargo van. A two-box design is like a station wagon, with one box for the passenger compartment and one for the engine compartment. A three-box design is like a traditional sedan with one box for the engine compartment, one for the passenger cabin, and one for the trunk.

For most of automotive history, automakers stuck with the three-box design. Traditionalists to the core, they never ventured too far from what was popular. But while the mass manufacturers stayed with the tried and true, others did dare to experiment.

John McElroy is host of the TV program "Autoline Detroit". Every week he brings his unique insights as an auto industry insider to Autoblog readers. Follow the jump to finish reading this week's editorial.

Gallery: One-box Designs

Click above for high-res gallery of the Italdesign Giugiaro Quaranta concept

Beauty may be in the eye of the proverbial beholder and all that, but the Italdesign Quaranta wasn't quite the beauty of the Geneva ball. And while Giorgetto Giugiaro, the celebrated designer at the studio's helm, has more iconic designs to his name than we could possibly list here, his latest was not his best, easily outclassed by the Giugiaro Mustang concept with which we fell so deeply in love and the Ferrari GG50 he built for himself.

The Quaranta concept was built to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Italdesign Giugiaro, and features the Lexus RX400h's mid-mounted hybrid 3.3-liter V6 powerplant driving all four wheels through a CVT and supported by a solar panel on the unfortunately styled nose. Think of archrival Pininfarina's Maserati Birdcage concept crossed with Robocop 3 and you're beginning to get the picture. While we're reassured by the knowledge that this is purely a design study and has no chance of seeing production, we wonder what the future holds if this is what's supposedly pointing towards it.

We managed to assuage our angst long enough to snap off a few photos, which we've added to the gallery below along with the images released by the studio.

Click to view in high resolution

Why do the Italians insist on teasing us so with their curves and sensuality? It seems like the design houses got together and decided to torture us for a few weeks leading up to this year's Geneva Motor Show. Pininfarina's been killing us slowly with the agonizing inch-by-inch unveiling of its Sintesi show car, the Bertones are playing cat and mouse about showing up with their BAT 11 concept altogether, even Giugiaro has joined in the fun.

A third image of Italdesign's forthcoming concept car has now surfaced ahead of schedule, giving us another hint at the design house's latest. Sources suggest it could be called the Quaranta ("forty" in Italiano) to commemorate the firm's fortieth anniversary, while the slogan "nature has never been so powerful" adorning the Italdesign-Giugiaro website suggests the concept will feature some sort of conceptual environmentally-friendly powertrain. With one week to go, we'll just have to sit tight and wait for the car's official debut, which is sure to be flanked by more curvaceous Italian models rivaling even their employer's penchant for teasing.


[Source: Giugiaro via Jalopnik]

click either image to view high-res

If you couldn't tell by all the previews for Geneva we've been posting, the upcoming Swiss-based motor show is a big one, one of the biggest of the year in the world. Italdesign Giugiaro has been building concept cars for shows like this one going on 40 years now. It made a huge splash at the 2006 LA Auto Show when the wraps were pulled off of the Giugiaro Mustang, so now any car under cover of Giugiaro has our curiosity piqued. The Italian design firm has begun releasing teaser images of its latest concept that will debut in Geneva, and from the veiled glimpses we get, it's looking pretty sharp. The unnamed concept (it apparantly ends in "ANTA") is appearing in conjunction with Giugiaro's 40th anniversary, so we expect a stunner. The Giugiaro Mustang, however, is a tough act to follow.



[Source: Giugiaro]

Some heralded the 2006 Giugiaro Mustang Concept as a portent of things to come for the Blue Oval's successful pony car. While that may be the case, we hope what happened to the car last Friday is not a bad omen for the next iteration of the Mustang. The Mustang Giugiaro Concept's designer, Fabrizio Giugiaro himself, was driving the car in Sofia, Bulgaria after showing it an exhibition when he scraped one of its concept rims against a concrete curb. While the damage was limited to just the front passenger-side rim, we suspect it will cost more to fix than buying a new Mustang outright.

Though over a year old since it was introduced at the L.A. Auto Show in 2006, the Guigiaro Mustang still managed to impress the Bulgarians, who said of the car, "words simply fail to describe the interpretation of the world-class coachbuilder." We agree, though we could come up with a few words to describe his parking abilities.

[Source: Novinite.com via Winding Road]

Sometimes the past deserves to remain in the past, but once in a while the automotive industry reaches into its history to resurrect something worthwhile whose demise was regrettable and whose return is welcome. The return of coachbuilding is one example of an industry trend we're glad is making a comeback.

Coachbuilding was popular decades ago among the extremely wealthy for whom the ordinary offerings of the automotive industry weren't anywhere near exclusive enough, so they had special bodywork fitted to regular cars to make them their own. Contemporary coachbuilt motors follow the same formula: an existing car fitted with new bodywork, and often customized mechanicals, for the most discerning and obscenely wealthy clients. Results have varied, but variety, as the saying goes, is the spice of life. Here we've chosen our ten favorite examples.

Click image for hi-res photo gallery

Well, those of us who didn't go to Geneva appear to have missed out on seeing some pretty interesting cars "in the metal." The Giugiaro VAD.HO, which we've previously reported on, is one of the better ones. It's one thing to see the car in press kit photos against a blank background. Seeing it alongside actual human beings is another thing entirely, and man, does this thing look good.

As we told you earlier, it's powered by the 12-cylinder from BMW's Hydrogen 7, which is mounted next to the two-person cockpit situated along the car's left-hand side. The press materials describe its overall size as being similar to that of the Ferrari 430, and we think the photos of it on the show floor bear that out. It's very sporty looking, with a nicely detailed front end (love those headlamp assemblies) and aggressive lines leading back to the equally pleasing tail. Follow the jump to read Giugiaro's full press release on the car, where you'll learn all about its aircraft-style controls, how it got its name, and interesting features such as the "umbrella" airbags that deploy in the event of an accident.

We're all for "concepts" such as the M3 Concept that BMW brought to the show, which are little more than not-so-sneaky previews of upcoming products. The "true" concept cars like the VAD.HO really capture the imagination, however. They're the ones that knocked our socks off as kids, and as evidenced by Giugiaro's latest creation, they're the ones that have that same effect on us as adults. Bravo.

[Source: Giugiaro]

The Motor Trend blog gave us a heads-up that thay've scored studio photos of the Geneva-bound Giugiaro Vadho concept car that popped onto everyone's radar last week. Looking like something you'd find in a Hot Wheels blister-pack, the Vadho's powered by the same V12 used in BMW's Hydrogen 7. Shifts come courtesy of the automaker's seven-speed SMG.

The driver and one passenger sit underneath the fighter jet-style canopy, and use joysticks (appropriate, given the aircraft-like seating arrangement) to control the car's drive-by-wire system. The engine is located to their right at the center of the car. Damon, Noah and special guest star Alberto Ballestin from Autoblog Spanish will bring you full coverage of this car and the rest of the goodies on display in Switzerland next week.

Head over to the MT blog to see a larger rear view of the Vadho concept.

[Source: Motor Trend blog]

click above image to view high-resolution version

Giugiaro has just released some details on the concept that it will be debuting at the Geneva Motor Show next week, the Vadhò hydrogen concept. Hot on the heels of its last concept debut, the Giugiaro Mustang, the Italian design firm has moved away from muscle cars and is going green with the Vadho. Built on a one-off chassis, the hydrogen concept is definitely trying to convey an aerospace theme with its tandem cockpit that could reportedly be set on the right, left or center depending on the country in which it would be driven. The Vadhò also eschews the traditional steering wheel in favor of two joysticks that drive the car's mechanicals via a by-wire system. In a concept like this, the actual powerplant, in this case a hydrogen one, goes wherever the passenger's aren't, mainly near the back next to the passenger.

Finally, it's been noted that the big, red "G" on the nose of the Vadhò is actually the debut of Giugiaro's new logo. The design firm is a really on a roll lately and making a name for itself again since the debut of the Giugiaro Mustang concept, so it only makes sense a new logo would be called for to capitalize on all the attention.

[Source: Winding Road]

Click on the image above to view our 21 high-resolution images

It's a delicate balance combining American muscle with Italian design. A handful of custom Italian coachbuilt Corvettes managed to marry the two with considerable panache in the late 50's, but most would agree that the Pininfarina-designed Cadillac Allante of the early 90's was a big step backwards. The most recent attempt carried off the combination with beautiful synergy when legendary automotive designer Giorgetto Giugiaro's Italdesign styling house reinterpreted the classic Ford Mustang in distinctive Italian style. The result was an Italian beauty to rival the best of them, yet faithful to the iconic Mustang shape. Scissor doors and Ford Racing-tuned American muscle under the hood.

When Giugiaro's mouthwatering creation bowed at the Los Angeles auto show several months ago, we called it "rolling automotive pornography". There's no big news here, but we had the pleasure of beholding the show car's beauty when it took the stage again in Detroit, and we were happy to snap a few photos for your viewing pleasure.

Click here or on any of the tantalizing images below to see our high-resolution image gallery of 21 pictures from the 2007 North American International Auto Show in Detroit. For some bonus fun, check Autoblog reader Eric's take on what the 2009 Mustang will look like when it adopts some cues from Giugiaro Concept.