Gorden Wagener: “The more influence design has the better”
Gorden Wagener, chief design officer of Mercedes-Benz Group, describes the exciting moment the full-width Hyperscreen launched and how to create valuble design in the luxury segment
I believe the car’s exterior design will always remain the main purchase reason, so we give that special attention, but without compromising on our spectacular interiors. We are working right now on ‘Sensual Purity 2.0’ which will place more emphasis on our iconic history and how Mercedes can make a difference in the ‘sea of sameness’, those faceless cars that all look alike and have no real mojo or identity.We want to differentiate through iconic elements and products.
We have the longest history. I was in our museum the other day and when you see all the significant Mercedes vehicles and their meaning, we want to put more emphasis on that. With ‘Sensual Purity 1.0’ we put a lot of emphasis on ‘purity’ and ‘emotion’ and we’ll still play with these two elements, but maybe in the future we will place more emphasis on ‘respect’ as well.
What does ‘respect’ mean in car design? When somebody wants to buy a Mercedes, it’s typically a person who has achieved something in life and wants to express that achievement through their car. Our cars should reflect that in their design. We’ll start to show that next year, to give you a better idea.
Design creates immense value, especially in the luxury segment and if a company wants to be successful, it has to count on design. The more influence design has the better.
Regarding interiors, once you’ve launched a full-width Hyperscreen I don’t think there’s a way back. We had this epic moment, introducing it in 2021 for our EQS and later in our EQE models. But I remember when it was just a sketch from our former Como Studio in Italy, where we dematerialised the instrument panel by replacing it with a 3D freeform screen.
There are so many use cases for screens in cars, including watching movies and playing games, and there will probably be even more as autonomy increases. Do sports cars need a screen? Maybe not. And if voice control becomes good enough, then maybe you won’t need a screen at all, but I doubt it. I think you will always need some visual reference.
Screens are not ‘luxury’ though and they’re everywhere. So you have to create luxury beyond the screen, possibly with new analogue elements. We’ve founded a team of physical industrial designers and digital UX designers that now work together, because a great interior design should always be a combination of hardware and software.
Design creates immense value, especially in the luxury segment and if a company wants to be successful, it has to count on design. The more influence design has the better. The design department doesn’t just get an engineering plot with dots and connects them.
We make sure we have the dots in the right places. That leads to great proportions that then allows us to ‘take stuff out’, to remove the unnecessary – in line with our design philosophy.We make sure we build the house right, together with good engineers – and that applies to combustion-engine, as well as electric cars. We’ll always make sure Mercedes vehicles have stunning proportions.
You’re not ‘just doing another car’. You’re filling the next frame in a long history of iconic products and have the chance to create something extraordinary.
We’ve changed the way we run our international design centres a bit. With locations in Germany, France, China and the USA, we are able to capture diverse cultural influences in all our strategic markets and foster creativity. Under the guidance of Stefan Lamm, these centres are becoming more like independent consultancies.
In fact, we want to keep these teams as uninfluenced by headquarters as possible, so they can give us more alternative proposals. We also just changed our China Studio set-up. We had two separate studios, one for UI and UX, and another for exterior, interior and colour and trim. But now we’ve moved them together in a new studio on the 46th floor in Shanghai with a great view over The Bund waterfront. We claim to be the highest car design studio in the world, which we are!
Why should designers come to Mercedes? Our studios in Shanghai, southern France and California are iconic places, but it’s more about the product. That was the main reason for me joining Mercedes, because you’re not ‘just doing another car’. You’re filling the next frame in a long history of iconic products and have the chance to create something extraordinary. That’s the greatest opportunity with Mercedes.
And last but not least, I think we have a great team. We are a big family and with every family there are fights and friendship, but we are running an emotional business to create emotional products, so we need to enjoy what we do. And we are quite blessed to be able to do so.