Interior Motives - Autumn 2012

A relatively small team worked on the fourth-generation Range Rover interior - just eight, including colour and trim. Four designers sketched during the initial exploratory phase under the direction of Interior Design Manager, Nic Finney, and Interior Design Creative Specialist Mark Butler. “In the Range Rover, the horizontal is the dominant element and vertical elements support that,” explains Butler. “[In these three sketches] we were exploring ways of configuring that within the architecture of the IP. The Range Rover interior is very much about letting the horizontal features run full width but encapsulating them with the end caps to frame the instrument panel. In the last-generation model, veneer became a very structural component. We wanted to develop that…so being able to use those structural elements, the topper pad and the main beam, was very important.” The fi rst sketch – showing a dominant vertical element through the centre of the car – was rejected for “not being what Range Rover is about”, while the second was dismissed for failing to show the end caps: “This is something that is inherent to the Range Rover architecture.” The third sketch, says Butler, was a “very strong contender. But we felt that the leather ‘beam’ which wraps up to the end of the IP would limit the amount of veneer that we could put into the interior space”.

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The 2012 Beijing Auto Show marked the birth of a new Chinese brand, Denza – a joint venture between Daimler and BYD forged to bring luxury-orientated electric mobility to the world’s largest car market. Its opening gesture is the New Energy Vehicle concept (NEV) – a 4.7-metre-long, four-door electric sedan that previews the company’s fi rst production car, in development since April 2010 and scheduled for launch at Shanghai 2013.

This moodboard explores the central interior themes of the NEV concept, the most important of which, says Denza’s chief designer (and Vice President of the Daimler Advanced Design Centre of China) Olivier Boulay, is ‘Hutong’ – the Chinese word for the traditional grey-stone luxury homes that can be found throughout Beijing. “Beijing is a city of contrast between old and new; you can jump from a Hutong into a skyscraper in a matter of minutes,” says the French designer. “Hutongs have a strong cultural heritage in China, and a lot of them are being renovated into very nice high-end restaurants for example. This told us that we could treat the interior of the NEV with this Hutong atmosphere – this grey feel – and still make it modern and sophisticated,” he says, before adding, “Turning a grey interior into something that is warm, lively and charming was a hell of a challenge, though.” Other key inspirations include calligraphy (on the seats), fl ow (the floor pattern), ‘Liuli’ handcrafted lighting (ambient lighting system) and tasteful, elegant luxury trends.

The finished interior features a practical PVC floor with a unique pattern developed for Nissan that’s reminiscent of a metal flooring found in industrial buildings called ‘five-bar tread plate’.

The close-up of the Tendo wood and acrylic door panel shows the refinement of the finish well, and also reveals where Aoki found space for the aircon controls: at the front of the driver’s side armrest.

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Launched earlier this year and themed ‘What Comes Next? – Make Your Mark on the Car of Tomorrow’, this year’s contest attracted entries from an incredibly diverse range of schools and nations, including Iran, India, South Korea and Sweden. The ceremony – presented by acclaimed vehicle designer and former BMW design Director Chris Bangle – was the culmination of a six-month quest to find the most talented student designers studying anywhere in the world, and saw prizes awarded in eight categories.

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