Hyundai has pulled back the curtain
on its upscale aspirations. The Korean auto-maker unveiled the Vision G Concept
Coupe at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in August and showed the car
again a few days later at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.
The full-size coupe hints at
what the brand's flagship Equus sedan will look like when it debuts next spring
at the New York auto show. The sleek Vision G was designed
at the Irvine, Calif., studio led by Chris Chapman -- under the watchful eye of
Peter Schreyer, head of design for both Kia and Hyundai, who moved to the
Korean group in 2006 after a 26-year career at Volkswagen and Audi.
Staff Reporter David
Undercoffler sat down with Chapman, 49, and Schreyer, 62, together last month
during Monterey Car Week to talk about their latest project.
Q: You've said this model
hints at what your next full-size production model will look like. What
elements will make it to production?
Peter Schreyer: The way this
line runs through the car [pointing to the sharp crease that starts just above
the headlight and runs along the side of the car to the taillight], the way the
front is done, a big C-pillar and the same kind of proportions, even if this is
exaggerated.
Chris Chapman: The general
expression of the headlight, the shape of the grille. It's basically the same
architecture, differently proportioned because the car that's coming out is a
different animal than this.
PS: The interior, it's very
close to where we're going.
CC: I want to say that's an
industry first [pointing to the curved navigation screen integrated into the
top of the dashboard].
PS: When you see a
curved-screen TV, I don't really know what to do with it. But a curved screen
in a car makes perfect sense since it doesn't reflect as much as a straight
one.
CC: The basic [instrument
panel] shape is meant to be expansive in a horizontal kind of way. We like to
do interiors that aren't screaming for attention.
PS: Especially for the
flagship-type car, it's really important to expand on the idea of logic and
things being in the right place. The interior is about architecture and
ergonomics. It's the materials, and if things are not in the right position, it
can drive you mad. It can be dangerous, even.
That's something I have been
dealing with a long time with all those Audi and Volkswagen interiors, many
dozens of them. Right now, we're working on an interesting system for the
[multimedia interface], an element where you can scroll on a touchpad or push
buttons around it, but at the moment, it's in kind of a research phase.
Explain the door handle
that's not actually on the door.
CC: There's this image that
I have growing up of the president of the United States getting on board Marine
One helicopter. There's that Marine standing there, and he's kind of a sentinel
next to the door. There is that old image of opening doors ... for the door to
not be the focal point. When you're coming up to it, and there's someone at a
fixed position who can say, "Good morning," and hit the lever for the
door without this awkward shuffling around the person.
Does it get tiring to have
people compare the concept to other brands?
CC: It's always been that
way. I'm looking for the person who is looking at sections: "silhouette, I
like it; rear three quarter, I like it; front three quarter, I like it;
beautiful car." But not where the first words out of their mouths are
"taillight" or "grille," where they've zoomed in on
everything.
I'm looking for ... people
that appreciate that and don't go necessarily right to the details and go,
"Oh, why is the door handle not on the door ?" and "Why is the
taillamp vertical? You're supposed to go horizontal."
PS: If you're too much
focused on the details, you lose the idea of what it looks like far away. I
think it's more important to recognize a car from a far distance and say,
"This can only be a Hyundai."
With Hyundai, is it liberating not
to have a heritage to draw on as designers are expected to do at a brand that's
been around a century?
PS: This is our chance to
build up the brand and also find character elements and a certain look, a
certain DNA that tells you, "OK, it's a Hyundai." The product range
is so wide, from very small cars, cheap cars made for the Chinese or whatever
foreign market, up to the luxury segment.
CC: At Hyundai ... you're
not offending people ... when you come out with a radical change in the design
development. People have a tendency, if they're connected to a particular
brand, to get offended. "How could you possibly change my BMW or my 911?
What did you do?"
Peter, now that you've been
head of Kia and Hyundai design for about two and a half years, where do you see
taking the Hyundai design direction?
Hyundai is in a different
stage than Kia was when I started. And there have been some great achievements
from Hyundai. I think that whole "fluidic sculpture" story has
something about it; Hyundai was quite challenging this way, and many other
brands followed. Hyundai was quite bold.
In a way, I want to build on
this, only I want to make it a bit more organized, a bit more refined, and more
architectural, and not just for the sake of a shape.
I don't want to lose this
emotional and sculptural design at all. But I want to develop it to the next
step and add that kind of German logic to it (laughs).
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