Niels van Roij lacks Smart’s strong first design period
If there’s one brand that lives a short, but intensely tumultuous life, it’s Smart. Car designer Niels van Roij explains why the design of the #1 with its combination of intellectual emptiness will not do the brand any good.
Smart was born from the idea of Nicolas Hayek, director of watchmaker Swatch. Nicolas saw a gap in the market for efficient, relatively luxurious, small two-seaters. He bet on a collaboration with Volkswagen. This allowed him to enter the market without having to compete against all the major manufacturers and to benefit from development, sales and after-sales.
But after a short period Smart had to make way. According to CEO Piëch, the economical Volkswagen Lupo 3L had a better future and he canceled the collaboration.
After talks with BMW, Fiat, General Motors and Renault, Hayek found a new partner in Mercedes-Benz. This is how the name Smart was put together: Swatch Mercedes ART.
A series of concept cars was drawn, such as the eco-sprinter and eco-speedster. A range of production models and also financial constructions followed. All without much success. Even for giant Mercedes, it turned out to be exceptionally complex to sell relatively cheap, small city cars. Despite the ingenious engineering and hugely refreshing design ideas. Ultimately, Mercedes got the full shares of the ailing brand.
From 2019, Mercedes-Benz entered into a new partnership. Now with car giant Geely, from Ningbo, China. That means a lot of good for the electrical engineering of the # 1. But given the design superficiality that has become a hallmark of Mercedes-Benz in recent years, it’s little surprise that the #1’s design lacks all the creativity, innovation and uniqueness that once made the brand so special.
The #1 is an anonymous blob with Mercedes-Benz inspired front and rear lights. The car can’t match the brilliantly drawn 1998 Smart City Coupé, nor the Roadster Coupe, Roadster and ForFour that followed. The latter comes closest to #1. But this one is much more interesting. The ForFour does tell the Smart story through design, including the tridion safety cage and interchangeable plastic body panels.
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What should have been a good new start turns out to be the least authentic Smart ever. The non-descript look doesn’t add anything to the content that’s at the heart of this all-new design – let alone that of the brand itself.
Smart’s design was once informed by an infinitely progressive mindset. That the brand was plagued by wrong gearboxes and elk tests does not detract from the visionary car design work that underpinned it.
The style of the Smart #1 does its engineering design a disservice. Completely compared to the Smarts, which are already 25 years old, which really brought a refreshingly original view of car architecture and which would probably have taken it much further with better technology.
Autodesign is about making a mentality visible, a point of view. In that light, the #1 suggests a combination of intellectual emptiness and passive-aggressive grandeur – the diametric opposite of the #1’s gentle, intelligent predecessors. With all its shortcomings, the #1 marks a major step in the completely wrong direction with its design. That makes the thing the most irrelevant Smart design in ages.
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– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl