AutoCritical

…continuing a series on exploring the role of aesthetics in automotive design

BMW shifted its target audience of its large luxury car market . Traditionally BMW’s were known, especially for their larger cars – the BMW 7 Series, to have a very conservative aesthetic which featured precision engineering. In this shift, BMW has undertaken a styling change to gain recognition no just for its engineering, but for its aesthetic qualities to appeal to a younger ‘individualistic’ audience. A reaction to this new direction has resulted in a backlash from many older BMW fans.

These were the conservative BMWs that were being made before the year 2000

“It moves away from everyone else and differentiates the brand – It makes a statement. The more you can get the consumer to be one with that vehicle and really link their emotion to that vehicle, which will translate into a situation where the consumer will say, `I want it.’  – What Chris Bangle (BMW Designer) is doing is reading that into the marketplace, and, rightly so, developing vehicles that go after individual emotions“  – Chris Cedergren (BMW’s Market Researcher)

Sometimes the senses and emotional response to the aesthetics of a car is so strong and/or unique that people develop special relationships with their vehicles. No doubt many may have a relationship with their car as a great deal of expense is invested in them, and although such relationships are also established with other products, there is something more about a relationship with the car.

After 2000 (2001 to be specific) - BMW revealed these two concept cars, the X-Coupe and the GINA - Followed up with the production of the BMW Z4

Click here for the design review on the 2009/2010 BMW Z4 Roadster

To make a possible comparison, another non-human relationship is those with animals/pets. Similarly with pets, we care for and clean them, we fuel/feed them, we are around them a lot and sometimes, we talk to them. This voluntary adoption of a machine and the responsibility that is involved probably adds to this as there is much time invested, just as a pet or a child. Maybe such a basis for this relationship can be drawn back to the time where people had horses  as their personal means of transport where as mentioned earlier with the pets; we also took care of them, as they were a symbol of freedom that we could travel further than we could with our own two feet. ‘Four feet are better than two’ – Four legs, four wheels…

Cars are almost alive; they need air to breathe. In a stronger manner of description, our relationship with our car could be seen by some as symbiotic where it will take us to places we want and need to go, and we will maintain it and care for it. From its rods and cylinders pumping inside the engine creating a beat, to the resulting purring of the engine, all of these elements have hints of something that is alive in nature.

References:
HAKIM, D. “BMW Design Chief Sees Art on Wheels; Some Just See Ugly”, (2002)
Lewin, T. “How to: Design cars like a Pro”, Motor Books International, (2003)

Military Jeeps are machines that were built to get from A to B in almost any condition. They have simple pressed steel panels screwed onto its frame to cover the engine and to hold other control parts in place. A square pane of glass stopped headwind, bugs and dirt blowing into the drivers face, and in combination with the tarp roof, stopped its occupants from getting mostly wet. To steer, the metal cast steering wheel attached to a shaft directly attached to the rack and pinion. In its raw and honest aesthetic they look tough and can handle any terrain. Without having even driven a Jeep, one can image the feel of the air and growling sounds of the engine with incremental ‘grunts’ of shifting gears. With no doors and agile animal stance, the Jeep has an ‘up and go’ appeal where you’d literally just hop in and grab the wheel and go.

Military Jeep, and a consumer production Jeep - Seize the day!

The need to be able to quickly get in and go to, perhaps get from one checkpoint to another, with no wasted time in opening doors and the ability of the vehicle to go through any terrain without preparation is justified. With the mass production Jeeps and Hummers, designers have captured these key characteristics from the original military functionality, but transformed an aesthetic that connotes a flexible, no boundaries lifestyle. Open top roofs, exposed frame work and half sized doors are reminiscent of the military style jeep. Even essential aesthetic qualities in the body paneling, like the flat front end with little overhang, large front grille and ‘slapped on’ wheel arches are very similar to the original Jeep.

These ‘features’ keep an already well established qualities that make a Jeep, a ‘Jeep’, but augmented by the used of imagery. Perhaps one could envisage the possibly for advertising/marketing material – visions of a sunny day, friends with sunglasses and surfboards sticking out the back of the open-air ‘leisure vehicle’ parked in a very ‘informal’ way in the sand. This vision gives the feeling that such a day happened spontaneously, where this vehicle allows you to, ‘up and go’ – picking up your friends and go to the beach, and get out and into the water as quickly got in – perhaps a ‘seize the day’ attitude.

Military and Consumer - Functionality aesthetic

Such a vision dramatically changes the aesthetic nature of the Jeep from something purely functional to a vehicle that has a focus more on the form, that is, the ‘form’ from a ‘functional vehicle’ (the military Jeep).  In the Wrangler and military versions of the Jeep, their connotative value is essentially still the same (to get in and get out), they have different denotative aesthetics in regards to their function and form.