By
EWAN KENNEDY
1 January 2007
Styling is everything in car design. Everything. No matter how well
it performs in the areas of handling, braking, passenger space and ride
comfort, if a car doesn’t look right it will struggle forever in the
sales race.
One comment comes up frequently when I
talk to potential car buyers, "All cars look the same these
days". This is certainly not a new complaint, indeed long before I
was born, I’m sure the same remarks were being made. Look back at any
era in car styling from about 1920 onwards and there's a strong
similarity between the mainstream models from just about every marque.
Which brings me to the other oft heard
complaint about car styling, "It looks very different doesn’t
it?" Because from time to time car designers try to make a big
break from styling convention – and more often than not they come
unstuck in a big way.
Let's take a few of the most recent
entries in the ‘very-different’ stakes. The number one example in
Australia has to be the Ford AU Falcon. It sported a sleek modern shape
that was way ahead of its time. Trouble was that the AU was rubbished so
much that poor old Ford Oz was forced to replace it years ahead of
schedule with the conservative BA Falcon.
I've long held a theory that if Ford had
launched the BA in 1998 and replaced it with the AU in 2002 then the
public would have sung the praises of the new Falcon’s shape. Being
ahead of your time can be dangerous in the car styling business.
On the other hand, I’m not sure the
Ford Taurus would every have looked good, no matter when it had been
introduced…
Take as a further example of a shape
ahead of its time: BMW and its controversial boot lid on the 7 Series.
Chris Bangle’s shape was reviled far and wide, the attackers sometimes
taking a frighteningly personal attitude that I know seriously worried
Bangle and his wife.
Take a look at the number of new car
designs released since the 7 Series that unashamedly copy the
squared-off boot lid of the 7 Series to see what I mean. Toyota,
Hyundai, even Mercedes…
Mitsubishi has had a similar styling
problem with its Outlander. The original model took at fascinating new
tack, especially in its frontal treatment that almost looked concept-car
in its treatment. Yet it was criticised so often by so many than that
Mitsubishi has gone all conservative in its just-introduced second
generation.
SsangYong has taken a battering for its
various styles, the lines being too Korean for eyes brought up on an
endless diet of European and pseudo-Euro car shapes. Yet SsangYong's
Stavic people mover, which I admit to finding confronting at first
sight, is starting to make a lot of sense, particularly in the area of
the clever rear-end design with its pseudo-sloping roofline.
I now like it, yet find I’m in a
minority of about three, at least for the time being, in my opinion on
the Stavic's lines.
The biggest problem about a style that
attempts to break out of the "all cars look the same" mould is
that if it doesn’t work, which happens more often than not, sales
slump, often to the stage of the car company losing staggering amounts
of money.
So it comes as no surprise that the next
time around, the maker comes up with an ultra-conservative shape that,
while it offends no one, doesn’t endear it to anyone, either. And that’s
sad.
