Chris Bangle quits auto industry.

[bmer]

With AVH being promoted to Director of design BMW AG, 2 spots in BMW design department are now open: Head of design BMW Automobile, and Chief of interior design BMW Automobile.

I'm eager to see who will be filled in.

I was about to ask about who was the replacement for Adriaan Van Hooydonk. Karim Habib perhaps? Or Verena Kloos?

 

[SCOTT27]

To understand how Chris presents ideas and influence watch this.

YouTube - Chris Bangle presents BMW 1 Series

Unfortunately not everyone listens.

and who can forget?

YouTube - Chris Bangle: Great cars are Art

This is how Chris presents a project he does it in exquisite detail he captivates his audience and at BMW everybody listens because you learn that the car endures passion and innovation.
No other car designer or manufacturer allows such creative freedom as PR.

 

[EnI]

I was about to ask about who was the replacement for Adriaan Van Hooydonk. Karim Habib perhaps? Or Verena Kloos?

Karim is Director of Advanced Design Studio BMW Group right now. Verena still heads the DesignWorks. Verena is very successful there - so IMO she'll stay in Cali. Karim was promoted to the spot recently, so I expect him to stay there.

Perhaps Chris Chapman, or Anders Warming will be promoted to the Head of design BMW Automobile.
IMO Chapman has quite some chances to get promoted. He's a director of automotive design at DesignWorks at the moment.

What a change for BMW design dept. lately ... Boyer gone, Ninic gone, and now Bangle gone. All the "old guard" is practically gone.

 

[Deleted member 25]

Who is Boyer ? And btw Eni, you said that there was two visions for the iproject family, CB Team VS AVH Team but i thought everything was set by R&D and Marketing services ?

 

[kovachian]

Good riddance.

 

[EnI]

Who is Boyer ?

Boyke Boyer is an ex-chief of Exterior Design BMW Automobile, and the author of E38 7er. He retired prematurely due some health issues - and later Anders Warming was put in his place. A year or two ago.

And btw Eni, you said that there was two visions for the iproject family, CB Team VS AVH Team but i thought everything was set by R&D and Marketing services ?

Strategy proposals are based on multidisciplinary analyses - incl. trend researches & predictions (tech, design, enviroment etc), technological progress forecasts, customer behavior analyses, legislation trends (eg polution, car safety), upcoming tooling techniques, production & logistic sloutions etc, competition scanning, SWOTs, branding & positioning aspects, financial point of product planning (predicted material & production prices, costs of capital etc) etc.

This is the frame set by marketing & R&D & finance mainly ... and within this frame several design strategies (the crative part) are made, and discussed. It's not all simple black&white situation. Different markets favour diferent things, yet the product has to be global. Every strategy is discussed & advocated heavily, and in the end BoD decides for right(?) one.

As I understand AvH & CB did support different strategies - and the one supported by AvH was more persuasive & suitable for some reason, I guess, and the BoD gave it a nod. It just happened last week. I'll try to find out what strategy was chosen.

Design process is still a creative & emotonal process -and I guess without sharing the same vision a confidence can't be built. I can't imagine Bangle advocating for a particular design of some future Project i cars when he doesn't even agree with the basis / vision on which that design is based.

Eg. imagine Bangle supporting modern & sharp approach, while the chosen strategy directs retro & soft lines. It's hard even to participate in such process, and even harder to advocate for something you don't believe in.



Back in early 90s BMW BoD had to decide what to do with BMW design. They only know something has to be done. So, they were choosing between: retro, avant-garde, evolution, revolution. And they opted for avant-garde on which all the "Bangle cars" were based. Incl. GINA - which was the mother of all inspiration.

They also had to pick design strategic for MINI & RRs well. And now Project i.




______________

PS: IMO (based on his history & ideology) Bangle was supporting one of the radical approaches for Project i, while AvH didn't.

 

[EnI]

It's also the truth Bangle said few months ago at some meeting he saw his role at BMW as "mission accomplished". He set up a great design team.

17 years working for same company ... Many bosses were gone, he stayed.

Could it be the man is already a bit tired as well?

Whatever ... I'm sure there will be tears in design department. Since he was a great motivator and tutor. With great hearth & great ideas. A great man!

He will surely be missed. He was the sun of BMW design departments. And the media also lost a star.




Also ... He will surely be written in the history of the aoutomotive designe as one of the most influential & forward thinking designers. As somebody said: he was Pablo Picasso of aotomotive design.

 

[SCOTT27]

Boyke Boyer .

And where it all began ...

And of course another fascinating interview.

http://designtaxi.com/features.jsp?id=100246

And of course before the new model expansion , the eve of the E85 Z4 .

BMW - Driven by Design Sameer’s Stuff

Even more interesting reading.
http://darmano.typepad.com/for_blog/BMW_case_study.pdf

 

[Deleted member 25]

He's german ?

 

[far2000]

He's german ?

American, If im not Mistaken...

 

[Zonda]

I guess I'm one of the few here that is disappointed Bangle was toned down and didn't get to do his thing all the way.

 

[wombatt]

Amen!

 

[mike.blueberry]

i'm going to join everyone else and say thank God
BMW is focused on engineering and driving pleasure, and not on dearing designs which belong more at Citroen.

Finally, the era of shut lines that hurt the eyes (5 series tail lights)
- of flame surfacing that hurts the eyes (E85 Z4)
- of headlights so stretched backwards that they'd make Donatella Versace's surgeon jealous
- of designs that are so heavy with lines, surfacing, hysteric shut lines, blinkers and logos, making you want to take an eraser and wipe all that detailing out

is finally finally over!!!!!


Mike

 

[far2000]

i'm going to join everyone else and say thank God
BMW is focused on engineering and driving pleasure, and not on dearing designs which belong more at Citroen.

Finally, the era of shut lines that hurt the eyes (5 series tail lights)
- of flame surfacing that hurts the eyes (E85 Z4)
- of headlights so stretched backwards that they'd make Donatella Versace's surgeon jealous
- of designs that are so heavy with lines, surfacing, hysteric shut lines, blinkers and logos, making you want to take an eraser and wipe all that detailing out

is finally finally over!!!!!


Mike

 

[EnI]

i'm going to join everyone else and say thank God
BMW is focused on engineering and driving pleasure, and not on dearing designs which belong more at Citroen.

Finally, the era of shut lines that hurt the eyes (5 series tail lights)
- of flame surfacing that hurts the eyes (E85 Z4)
- of headlights so stretched backwards that they'd make Donatella Versace's surgeon jealous
- of designs that are so heavy with lines, surfacing, hysteric shut lines, blinkers and logos, making you want to take an eraser and wipe all that detailing out

is finally finally over!!!!!

Far from that!

Heavy detailing, wild lines, surfacing etc: still there. Check Z4 & X1. Yet much more precisely executed then in Ver. 1.0. More polished.

Stretched lights ... weird shut lines ... Gone? Don't be so sure.

Yogi Berra once said: "It ain't over till it's over".



So wait ... Otherwise you'll need another quote by Berra. "It's like deja vu all over again."

But it's true it will take quite an effrot to out-radicalize the E65, E85 & E60 etc I guess such radical executions are "not trendy" right now.

 

[mike.blueberry]

Far from that!
Heavy detailing, wild lines, surfacing etc: still there. Check Z4 & X1. Yet much more precisely executed then in Ver. 1.0. More polished.
Stretched lights ... weird shut lines ... Gone? Don't be so sure.
Yogi Berra once said: "It ain't over till it's over".
So wait ... Otherwise you'll need another quote by Berra. "It's like deja vu all over again."
But it's true it will take quite an effrot to out-radicalize the E65, E85 & E60 etc I guess such radical executions are "not trendy" right now.

In that case EnI, you need to talk to your colleagues and people who are influencial in the BMW design department. and change their mind

History, but also the present, is abundant with cars that are beautiful, just because of that, not because of shut lines, blinkers, stretched lights, or design tweaks. Stapling big earings to a woman's ears will not make her more beautiful. It would only be an attempt to distract in the case that she is not beautiful.

The heavy detailing and wild lines are exactly what's wrong with all BMWs since the E85, hurting BMW's image since they are already percieved as flash cars. For a car company that has so much to offer under the hood, that's a strategic mistake in my opinion.
and yes, the new Z4 is amazing in dark colors imho because all the shut and flame lines are much less visible.

below are beautiful cars that didn't need any help from the cosmetic tricks repertoire to look bafflingly good:

Mike

 

[PanterroR]

Ferrari and Ford - yes, but that Transformers on the top - no way! IMO of course...

 

[martinbo]

I'm sad in a way about this news - I'm a big fan of Bangle: his public image, intellect, unconventionalism and energy were admirable. I can't think of another head of design as prolific as Chris Bangle. It's not that I think BMW Design is going to miss him, rather I feel sorry for him that his future vision did not (allegedly) align with that of the BoD.

Chris Bangle more likely ushered in a new way of thinking about car design rather than the actual designs themselves. It's one thing to be able to pen a controversial and comfort-zone bending new design - it takes a totally different kind of person to "sell" the thinking behind the design to key stakeholders.

I've said it before in a thread elsewhere: BMW's once-polarising designs of the early millennium was the single greatest catalyst for a major paradigm shift in car design. With any form of major change comes discomfort and even pain. Bangle, AVH and BMW took a massive leap of faith and it came with tons of discomfort and a fair deal of pain. But, in the end, they all took it on the chin and stuck to their convictions. The result is that consumers' perceptions, attitudes and open-mindedness became far more malleable and tolerant of change.

This gamble has paid dividends in my opinion; consumers have had time to get over the initial shock and the reaction to later designs is far less abruptly dismissive. It was this strategy that, in my mind at least, laid the foundation for a whole new future of BMW creativity, identity and progression.

So, too bad you gotta go Chris. All good things come to an end eventually but for what it's worth: Good on ya mate.

 

[martinbo]

Interesting opinion Mr. Blueberry (that's what my surname means in Czech)

But in all honesty, it's really hard to design an ugly mid-engined supercar. Heck even Audi almost didn't quite nail it with the R8. From when we're little boys, what's the first car we starting scribbling? Yup, mid-engined, pointy-nosed supercars.

There are a myriad of utterly gorgeous designs of fast exotica that you could've posted that would widely be regarded as spectacularly beautiful. The Miura and F40 spring instantly to mind. [The Murcielago btw looks like a big wedge of yellow Cheddar]

Now, show me a truly good looking four-door, mid-sized saloon from the mid-2000's... they're much fewer and further between. The E60 just wasn't nicely proportioned, the A6 looked like an elongated piece of dull, the E-Klasse was classic but not very modern, the Jag S-Type was retro-hideous and the Lexus GS was just plain odd. I find it amazing that during the era of that group of cars not one, not a single one, stands out as a virtuoso styling achievement.

So, some cars, evidently, are harder to make pretty than others.

 

[mike.blueberry]

Interesting opinion Mr. Blueberry (that's what my surname means in Czech)
But in all honesty, it's really hard to design an ugly mid-engined supercar. Heck even Audi almost didn't quite nail it with the R8. From when we're little boys, what's the first car we starting scribbling? Yup, mid-engined, pointy-nosed supercars.
There are a myriad of utterly gorgeous designs of fast exotica that you could've posted that would widely be regarded as spectacularly beautiful. The Miura and F40 spring instantly to mind. [The Murcielago btw looks like a big wedge of yellow Cheddar]

I agree for the Miura and the F40. I posted the Murcielago because of the simplicity of its lines, if you want to do something that looks different, it doesn't have to be tortured.
Now though, front engine? here's just a couple:

Bear in mind, there will always be subjective opinion, you might like other cars, but truth is there are beautiful front engine coupes out there.


As for the point of the sedans, that is a very good point, which I will ponder upon.
But it is true that in the 90's, that problem wasn't there: the E39 5series was beautiful, and some others like the cadillac sts of the 90's maybe.


Mike