1946 Orwell Essay Finds The Road To Good Design

WHAT MAKES good design? It is a question often asked in interviews, and though answers vary widely, the shared view is that simplicity is central to a product's appeal. However designers exist in a business that needs to make money and design is necessarily complicated by demands of other departments. Marketing is one of them. To paraphrase George Orwell, design is often used ‘to make lies seem truthful… and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind’. So his six criteria for good writing from his essay Politics and the English Language might well apply to design. Let’s see how they can be translated.

1.       Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

For designers, that could mean never using a theme from a model already in production, but it is also a warning against over-familiarity. 


2.       Never use a long word where a short one will do.

This is a matter of avoiding complication. Keep it simple, stupid.


3.       If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

Lines on a design to are often added for drama. Get rid of as many as possible. In a recent interview with Car Design News, M-B Design Director Gorden Wagener said, “If you like a line, get rid of it. If you still like it, get rid of another one.” The Mercedes-AMG GT is a fine example of the application of this rule. 

4.       Never use the passive where you can use the active.

The message of the design needs to be visible at the first read. This is most effectively communicated by proportions. For example, the message of power and virility is immediately evident in the Dodge Viper, whereas a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, while having similar characteristics, relies on overblown details.

5.       Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

Every brand has its own style that designers call a language. In consumer product design, Apple has long led the way with a minimalist aesthetic. Samsung inter alia was found guilty of copying it. Always speak the tongue of your brand.

6.       Break any of these rules sooner than say something outright barbarous.

Beauty, or attractiveness (not necessarily the same thing), is the ultimate objective. The R107 Mercedes SL has a Pagoda-inspired trunk deck (Rule #5 broken), and an abundance of horizontal lines (Rule #3 gone). Yet the message of glamour is strong enough (Rule #4) that those aggrievances become complicit to character, proving that while rules make useful guides, nothing beats judgment. Or, in the case of the SL, chrome.

These points do little to reflect the fact that Orwell wrote alone, whereas designers operate in a company of thousands. But nurturing a little independence even in such an organisation can help provide a sense of perspective, which allows us to question whether what we are doing is the Right Thing. Orwell goes on to comment that 'the enemy of clear writing is insincerity'. So what makes good design? Extrapolating his statement, I think the answer might be sincerity.

2013 Volvo Coupe Concept Knows Its Sausages

THIS SWEDISH company has defined itself on not being German, so the appointment of two Volkswagen designers, Thomas Ingenlath and Max Missoni, might seem unusual. Yet the result is a striking three-box coupe that will remind many of the Audi A5. This third box is an important feature: a low, flat deck, ending in a chamfer, resolutely eschews the diminishing tails on cars such as the Mercedes-Benz CLS, and keeps the proportions outlined by the P1800 in check, and indeed the BMW E9, which shares a similar centre-line. 

This Teutonic association continues in the details, especially the rear corner where the lights from the Volkswagen X1 concept are mirrored. It is a compatible theme with the iron badge, however, and the lights appear like sections through metal beams, especially the T-beam DRL at the front. Here, the Coupe Concept is classically premium: the lights are kept separate from the grille, and intricate details lift simple forms. The grille itself is exceptional, featuring a strong chrome band and vertical bars subtley concave, kept separate by a shadow gap.

Along the bodyside, purists are already recoiling from the broken curvature of the door-section, a Volvo trait lauded as a literal reflection of Swedish furniture. This easy-to-understand characteristic was compatible with the family-orientation of the products. That broken section has been expertly realized, however, planting the crease on the curvature, rather than using it as a break. The positive swell that runs along the shoulder is kept tense in section by sandwiching it between two tight negative fillets. It is telling that Volvo has steered away from using a wagon to hail in the new era: a three-box coupe is ideally suited to bend its themes to many more bodystyles. German solidity has been achieved in an unorthodox manner. It may not be familiar, but it is a design that will outlast the decade.

Volvo clearly has aspirations beyond being known for safety, but such is the dominance of the German premium brands in conveying premium-ness, it is hard to avoid lifting cues to do so. It highlights the quandary faced by many designers: how much brand equity can you sacrifice to become more attractive. With the Coupe Concept, there is enough Volvo DNA to keep cynics quiet, and the successful translation of the themes to the next XC90 has now been proven. With that in mind, perhaps those Germans ought to start worrying.

2013 Mercedes-Benz SL No Longer Melts The Heart

In 2002 I had a girlfriend who loved the Mercedes SL Pagoda. This was unusual, not just because I had a girlfriend. At that time the Pagoda was still in the shadow of the illustrious Gullwing, a plain Jane in the wake of a fulsome glamourpuss. Prices were low, and the chrome-bedecked R107 that followed the Pagoda was instead considered heir apparent. The Pagoda just seemed so… austere. How could the Pagoda’s creator, Paul Bracq, ever have considered it a worthy successor? 

Today the story is rather different. Of course, Gullwing prices are through the roof: that much was expected. But that flat-sided Pagoda is now considered pert and lithe, a stroke of brilliance from Bracq. It may not be Marilyn Monroe, but it didn’t have to be: Audrey Hepburn will do just fine. In the space of a decade or so, an opinion that seemed so fixed has changed completely. Since then I have always questioned the certainty of one’s taste, and indeed the certainty of certainty.

This makes design hard to objectify, but it hasn’t stemmed the prevalence of design clinics, where Joe Public is invited to opine at the latest proferrings of a company before they hit the road. But in an organizational sandwich, ‘process’ is evenly spread, and the criteria for success in numeric-based departments is awkwardly applied to aesthetic-centric design. All this could lead to a discussion on the degeneration of democracy to populism, and the subsequent erosion of expert insight, but I shall refrain. What I really wanted to talk about was ice-cream.

You might remember when Magnums first came out: fat wodges of vanilla ice-cream surrounded by thick milk chocolate. You might remember that first k-krunk as you took a bite, and a price that broke the pound barrier. Something simple (choc-ice on a stick, you might have vaguely thought) selling for more than the bells-and-whistles Cornetto. As an alternative to coffee on a hot beach, Magnums were a hit. 

The only time you’ll hear that k-krunk today is during TV ads. The chocolate has long since thinned and that aural entrance to the Magnum experience is a brittle krick of cost-cutting. Simply put, the appeal of Magnums was originally product-based. Now advertising trades on a memory; the rest is down to branding. You might say the same for the current SL. 

2015 Jaguar F-Pace Would Be A Rose By Any Other Name

FOR A long time, sports cars and SUVs were incompatible: this is now irrelevant. The question is how to mate them successfully. Yet the potentially awkward marriage of two opposites has been enough to delay Jaguar’s entry into the market for a decade. Such is the restraint often forced by mindset. Yet it is hard to see how Jaguar could have made a convincing SUV using pre-XF styling cues: Jaguar needed a chunkier design language in order to accommodate niche models, which despite leaving the sedans open to criticism at last manages to bend enough for an SUV.

The Jaguar F-Pace uses the bodyside theme and rear lights from the F-Type with the face introduced by the XF. The result is a pleasingly voluminous design that though simple, is well-resolved and well-planted. Welcome, too, is the absence of an undercut shoulder which leaves German rivals feeling mainstream. One crucial way in which Jaguar is successfully building up its identity is through the super-high belt-line: it could barely get any closer to the glasshouse. This theme was introduced by the XF and has been successfully applied to every Jag since, lending a solid, quality impression, if not exactly as light and lithe as they once were.

The carry-over of F-Type cues is pure Porsche philosophy, but the F-Pace name is less agreeable. It reflects a horizontal model strategy as Jag grows out as well as up, but sounds as if rational marketing thinking has missed the character of the car: it is a little nouveau. And while there is still some debate whether the F-Type is rival to the Boxster or 911, there is no doubting that the F-Pace has the Cayenne firmly in its sights. Yet step from the Jaguar to the Porsche, and there is a richness to the bodyside of the Cayenne that leaves even the Jaguar F-Pace feeling a little flat. This impression continues inside, where the investment differences between Porsche and Jaguar are far more apparent. Given the theme laid out by this show car, there seems to be a strong chance that the interior of the production SUV will borrow from the heavily-revised XF. The five seat layout of the concept also falls two short of rivals from Mercedes-Benz and BMW. But with a delete-badge option (including JAGUAR on the tailgate) all will be forgiven: Jag has given us another stunner.

In Memorium: 1999 BMW Z3 M Coupe

I SUPPOSE this was bound to happen at some point: a eulogy to my departed BMW M Coupe. You all know the car: small Z3-based coupe, M engine, developed by a renegade band of engineers to be the ultimate driving machine... It was the stuff of legends, and for a year it was mine.

Cast your mind to when you were young and that first romance with the wrong sort. The one who taught you all those little things, tying feathers to your heart as you soared higher. Your friends knew it would never work out, and secretly you knew they were right. That was the M Coupe, and like Icarus, the wings did not hold. Let me explain. 

It was another Monday morning, driving to work at Lotus. The main road gets pretty busy, so I stick to the lanes that twist through the villages. Radio on, following a C-Class estate. 30, 40mph; the C-Class pulls away as we exit the village (damn those turbo-diesels are fast). I followed suit, accelerating to a respectable 50mph before braking for the sharp right-hander I knew so well… At this point, a brief interlude: remind yourself that the back-end of an M Coupe is notorious for being eager to see what the front is up to when the weather dampens (did I mention it had just been raining?).

Too late; the back has already gone. Fast-forward three seconds and I am wondering whether I am going to roll. Oh yes, there we are. Snapshot in my mind: poppies upside-down, framed by the windscreen. I land, wheels-down (CRASH: there goes the under-carriage). I sit and turn off the engine, vaguely wondering why the airbag hasn't gone off. I gather my lunch and the blanket from the boot (a present from my sister-in-law, my wife would kill me if I lost it), and walk back through hedgerow hitherto unpenetrated. A police car and ambulance will soon arrive.

RIP 2010-2011

My wedding is month away, and the wedding car has just been destroyed. I hastily find a Z4 Coupe to hang the ribbon on instead. It is perfect. Fast, smooth, economical, good-looking. Not a day goes by when I don’t think back of the M Coupe. 

Remembering that car is like turning the pages of a photo album. Little events stick out, each narrated by the moment's joy. Keeping pace with a CL63 AMG. The other Estoril Blue Z3 M that trailed you from London. Wheel-spinning on your cousin’s lawn. Once, pulling up at the flat after work, I walked away from the car unable to stop looking over my shoulder. That slack hammock-like shoulder-line; goofy arches; obscene bonnet; fake-but-I-love-them-anyway side-vents; FOUR EXHAUSTS. I wondered whether it was actually possible to love an inanimate object. Yes it was, I concluded. Yes, it was.

Chronodynamics Is A Drag

"CHRONODYNAMICS IS the coefficient of styling in time". Having just thought of the term, I now feel obliged to define it. As a metaphor that pertains to aerodynamics, it helps to understand why some shapes date faster than others. What does it mean to date? Let's think of design as something that creates aesthetic turbulence as time passes. The greater the degree of turbulence, the quicker the form dates, and thus the level of attactiveness decreases. For example a car whose styling is considered timeless will have a low time-drag –the Porsche 911, perhaps. It will pass through time creating minimal drag, and continue looking attractive for longer. A car such as the Chrysler PT Cruiser, by way of contrast, has dated more quickly: its aesthetic concept is bluff retro, creating greater time-drag.

There are cars, however, that share the principles of the PT Cruiser that have stayed fresher for longer, the Mini being the notable example. How is it then that the Mini still looks attractive, but the PT Cruiser is no longer desirable? Partly this is down to styling resolution in volume and proportion, but there is more: marketing momentum. A more bluff chronodynamic form relies on momentum: this can be achieved through consistency in styling themes matured in successive generations of a given product; it can also be achieved by advertising. Mini uses both to provide the impetus behind a retro projectory. The Clubman, special editions, tightly kerned Helvetica caps, and Superleggera concept all bring life to what LJK Setright described as a ‘very convincing little brick’.

Now consider a more classically timeless design, say, the Honda S2000, designed by my former boss Daisuke Sawai. Many have all but forgotten this was Honda’s 50^th birthday present to itself; there was little to no memorable ad campaign. However the S2000 endures as an attractive car over a decade since its inception. It is chronodynamically efficient. The low time drag is achieved very simply: by being very simple. Its proportions are classically revivalist –long hood, short butt –the door-section is clean, the details are sparing and the product concept –that of a two-seat sports car –is the clearest in terms of relaying the package concept through styling. I use the term classically revivalist as this was a period in Italian art history when Helenistic, Roman and Egyptian objects were referenced in everyday items such as jewellery and clothing: that is, using the past to define the identity of present day items. It is retro retro.

There were no two-seat sports cars whizzing Caesar Augustus around, and I won’t be drawn into horses-pulling-chariot analogies; instead the classicist reference the S2000 revives is the 1901 Mercedes Simplex, the bedrock of today's car. This turn-of-the-century sports car nailed the package we still use today: engine out front, long dash-to-axle, seats behind engine just in front of rear wheels, trunk out back. We take it for granted now, and it is because we take it for granted that cars that assume this description will be inherently timeless.

Visualise then, for a moment, the drag your design will create in history. A design which leans towards nostalgia will need more push –ergo a rationale to support the whimsy. Yet a design which is advanced is equally and no doubt ironically also in need of support: a bridge that takes the casual observer/potential customer from the present day scenario to a believable future context in which the given product is more relevant. The bridge must vindicate the investment. Toyota successfully did this with the Prius. The media did the hard work for them, by embedding in popular thought the impending peril of the planet. So with the future context established, Toyota created a believable solution.

It is a lot harder when the future scenario is less clear, particularly during a time of economic flatlining. All those customers who so recently worried about the plight of the environment in ten years time now turn their eyes and their wallets to ten days time when the next pay-check arrives. Companies must replace the media in outlining a future scenario if they wish to sell eco-minded products, else natural conservatism will prevail. Conservative products free of garnish are ripe for timeless themes, but it is at the expense of communicating advanced technologies through styling. Whereas once car styling once used space ships and aeroplanes to flaunt technology of the future, today advertising does this job for us instead. This allows one design to be locally targeted across a range of markets, being easier to change words than bodysides. It makes perfect economic sense. But in diluting the exterior styling by forfeiting its communicatory role to marketing, when the check has been paid and the slogans forgotten, customers could be left with products devoid of the personality promised.

2015 Mercedes-Benz F015 Luxury In Motion Concept Shows The Value Of Enterprise

AN INTERIOR where anyone can sit anywhere, and where anyone can drive: this is the potential of autonomous driving. The car avoids accidents, so one need not wear a seatbelt. If you do have an accident, intelligent airbags inflate where required. The steering wheel is detachable, and can be passed from person to person to take control. Dashboards become less complex, buttons are fewer and screens are irrelevant because we all carry on our own device. Materials and quality and customization become even more important. It is a relaxing, open place to spend time and enjoy the company of others or the peace of solitude.  Mercedes hasn't gone quite that far with their latest concept, but in producing the F015 they have made a memorable start. 


Here's the message in two steps: fat seats suggest luxury; seats facing each other implies autonomous driving. And now Mercedes owns the image of luxurious autonomous travel. Nevermind that the rest of the interior looks like a set from Star Trek (screens do not an interior make), in terms of communicating a message the Mercedes is faultless. 

Faults are saved for the exterior instead, and here one sees the challenge designers face in providing an attractive shape while providing head-room over rear-facing front seats. It would be unfair to criticise the exterior too harshly, though, as it was always the interior that we are meant to see, but it does point to an interesting communications strategy. You won't see many poorly resolved concept cars from BMW or Audi, but Mercedes is willing to compromise design to gain an edge for innovation, which begs the question Does design or concept do more to reinforce brand image? 


Cars are the ultimate industrial design overachievers: throw a new market at it, introduce new legislation, tighten emissions and threaten congestion charge: so far every obstacle has strengthened the breed and cars are more capable than ever. It proves the desirability of the concept of private transport, a demand that shows no signs of withering. Underlying the success of the car is its supreme adaptability: A thirty year old Peugeot will drive on a road built last year in Pakistan by someone who was not born when the car was designed using fuel bought today.

But autonomous driving is more than taking your hands off the wheel and turning the front seats around; it is an opportunity for designers to redefine the relationship between man and machine. Traditionally this was done mechanically, through the steering wheel and gearshift and ride quality. Now, in an electric age, everything is assisted, and what we feel is largely artificial. We are in a peculiar purgatory between old-world interaction and a future where the car is simply transport. 

This is an indisputable trend, and it is your fault. You liked it when in 1951 Chrysler introduced power steering on the Imperial. You raved when gears silently shifted, and rejoiced when windows wound themselves: autonomy and anaesthetised cars are the culmination of many years of smaller innovations. We kept buying them, and maybe we are the last generation to know that a car used to provide feel. 

1951 Chrysler Imperial

That’s why I drive an older Mercedes. I want to smell leather, to view the road through untinted glass, and hear those colossal doors slam. It is one of the ironies of electric cars that their success coincides with the sales increases of those soulful classics. In the past cars felt mechanical simply because no alternative existed; now, with so many options available to designers we must be careful to do what is right, and not just what is possible.

2014 Audi Prologue Concept. I said, THE AUDI PROLOGUE CONCEPT

THERE ARE 15 trillion good reasons why grey is the new black, each one green-backed. Youth unemployment, stagnating wages and high personal debt means it is aging baby-boomers who will drive economic growth. You can bet your bottom dollar there will soon be myriad products designed specifically for the silver surfers. A Porsche Design stair-lift is closer than you think.

Age cannot be mentioned without health. The ‘internet of things’ means you can be sure your behaviour is being analysed. If you fail to use your Zojirushi I-Pot kettle in the morning to make tea, a relative is informed, just in case. You may not realize it, but your car is watching out for you too. It may not be pressing your hand, rolling up your sleeve or asking you to cough, but a car is fast becoming even more central to our lives, and indeed life.

A car is already a cage in which we shield ourselves to protect us from harm. Big steel pillars sealed with glass separate us from the vigour of our surroundings. Occasionally, they keep other bits of steel and glass out too. Volvo watches your eye movement: blink to often and a small coffee icon chimes to encourage a pit-stop. GM has experimented with sensors that immobilize the engine should you be over the alcohol limit. Brakes know when a wheel is slipping: if ever you’ve been caught in a downpour, traction control has been your guardian angel. Pity the Lincoln Sentinel missed exemplifying the virtue of its namesake.

So a car already does its best to keep you alive, now the goal is to improve your wellbeing. Massaging seats are just the start. They will also rise to meet you, swiveling to accept your corpulent buttocks. Augmented reality will improve visibility, and don’t worry if you never got the hang of touch-screens, buttons will fatten for rheumatic paws, or disappear in favour of voice-control. There is a long list of features that cars will have to tick-off if they are to remain relevant for an aging demographic. But what is the OAP aesthetic? Nissan Juke designers are already used to seeing their creations driven not by sk8erboiz, but by middle-aged women off to the garden centre. The raised H-point (seat height) helps: easy to get into for creaking limbs. But I wonder how many billions playful styling will garner from the trillions available. There is also the challenge of getting Gatoraded designers in the mindset of port-swilling retirees.

So how about the Audi Prologue concept? Of course it is really an A9, a name to draw Audi upmarket to target retired dentists in upstate New York. The designers are the same age as those in Nissan, but the non-niche classicist aesthetic looks suitably elitist and discerning. Over cigars at a dinner party, the A9 would be talking about campaign funds while the Juke juggles the bread rolls.

Having introduced you to my SLC earlier, I am inclined to draw comparison between it and the A9. Naturally, thirty years has brought a sea-change in proportions, but beyond this the thing that strikes you is that Audi has scored a coup with the C-pillar: the SLC’s louvred windows has been re-interpreted as the filler-cap. Audi also uses chiseled swells above each wheel to highlight Quattro provenance, but for both cars I see similarities in the classical proportions with generous brightwork that conventionally lures mature customers. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. But so far no car can stop you from driving at 15 mph in the gutter with the left-indicator blinking.

2015 Lexus NX Brings Hope To A Chemical World

2015 Lexus NX

IF YOU don't like the nomenclature used by car companies, look away now: this is about to get complicated. Sounding more like chemical formulae than soulful machines, Lexus names have seldom resonated with me. NX, LS, MSG... It is simply impossible to match name to character to car. So building on the LF-NX concept from last year, Lexus has built the NX, a premium SUV based on the Toyota RAV4. With me so far? Then let's continue.

2011 Lexus LF-LC Blue Concept

The Lexus periodic table spans attention-grabbing show cars and attention-seeking production cars. The brand is just beginning to consolidate the two, starting with the LF-Gh concept in 2011, which outlined a new face and fresh take on headlamps, followed by last year’s powerful LF-LC concept that introduced a dramatic gesture and beautiful interior.

The stance of the NX is defined by a high-point somewhere over the rear passengers, lending a gesture that is more dynamic than the surging Infiniti FX55. A triangular shoulder peaks in width at the B-post, where it creates a diagonal bone-line that intersects the front axle. The shoulder dives into the window-line ahead of the A-post, making way for a prominent front wheel-arch from which point forward the LF-LC’s face is found. 


At the back, the haunch resists bringing the shoulder out to cover the wide track: the vertical surface below pressing into the wheel-arch is the more memorable aspect. In this space, between arch and shoulder, the short surface is drum tight, giving a machined look that softens as one reaches the middle door-cut.

Much has changed since I first walked into a Lexus design studio. Today's cars embrace a deeper appreciation of worldly tastes, the richness now inherent in their designs as strong as the marketing and engineering that propelled the brand nearly thirty years ago. Japanese companies have been the slowest to promote foreign design leadership, so the mixing of cultures at Lexus must be the harbinger of change if their compatriots are to expect the same success.

Car Design Offers The Possibility Of Unperceived Existence

IF A tree falls in a road, and no one is around to move it, does it make a sound?  

After a dark and stormy night (it really was), I awoke to a battered day still nursing its boughs. At that time I was working in an adjacent studio which required crossing a busy road. That day, a large mass of foliage was causing cars to brake and swerve. I saw two almost collide. So the next time the traffic paused, I ventured into the road and lugged the fallen timber to the verge. Cars proceeded again.

It occurred to me that this was probably the most immediately useful task I have done as a car designer. For all the sweat and tears that car design entails, the nature of the work means that few projects make it to the road, and of those that are on the road, few explicitly reflect your contribution. One shouldn't finish a career without also removing branches from the road.