After presenting three ground-breaking
concept vehicles during the 2005-2006 global auto show season –
Sassou at the 2005 Frankfurt Motor Show, Senku at the
2005 Tokyo Motor Show and Kabura at the 2006 Detroit Auto
Show – Mazda’s global design team wasn’t about to rest on its
laurels. To keep energy levels brimming, and to begin the process of
evolving Mazda’s design and surface language for future Zoom-Zoom
vehicles, Mazda’s design division has invented a new surface
language called Nagare.
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NAGARE: (pronounced “na-ga-reh”)
Japanese for ‘flow’ and the embodiment of motion.
Under the direction of Mazda’s new
global design director, Laurens van den Acker, the challenge given
to the team was to invent a novel means of registering motion in
vehicles whether they’re moving or still. Nagare achieves that goal
while also signaling a fresh design direction for future Mazda
vehicles.
Nagare is the first of a series
of design concepts – some closer to actual production vehicles than
others – that Mazda will showcase this global autoshow season,
including Los Angeles, Detroit, Geneva and Tokyo.
Franz von Holzhausen, Mazda
North American Operations’ (MNAO) Director of Design, and the man
responsible for leading the US-based design team which developed
this vehicle, explains, “We’re looking well down the road with
Nagare. We want to suggest where Mazda design will be in 2020. To do
that, we redefined basic proportions and the idea of driving without
losing the emotional involvement. Mazda’s driving spirit will be
enhanced and intensified by Nagare.
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Mazda
Nagare
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“Mazda doesn’t produce concept
cars to spin its wheels, and while some are more
forward-looking than others, we simply do not create pure
flights of fantasy. We develop these ideas to demonstrate
what we really intend to build and sell. It took
soul-searching along with basic research to invent the new
surface language we’re calling Nagare.
The dynamic qualities of
Mazda products already do an excellent job of capturing
the spirit of motion so our goal was to move our design
language a major step beyond what we’ve already demonstrated
with Sassou, Senku, and Kabura.
von Holzhausen continues, “We
began by studying motion and the effect it has on natural
surroundings: how wind shapes sand in the desert, how water
moves across the ocean floor, and the look of lava flowing
down a mountainside. Natural motion registers an impression
in your brain and that’s what we hoped to capture with the
new Nagare surface language.
“Once we started sketching our ideas,
we weren’t surprised to find similar quests underway in other
product design disciplines. We found examples of motion influencing
the shape and surface of furniture, architecture, apparel, and
artwork. Nagare undoubtedly proves our confidence in identifying a
new and exciting visual language for Mazda as we lead the way in
defining the interaction of motion and flow in automobile surfacing.
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“We began by developing a
surface or textural language that describes flow. The motion
of the vehicle is defined by, and evident in, the texture of
its interior and exterior surfaces. There is no right or
wrong way to capture the impression of motion, so each of
the concepts we present throughout this global show season
will embody a different interpretation of our new surface
language.”
CONCEPT OF A CONCEPT
von Holzhausen describes
Nagare as “a concept of a concept.” It’s intentionally a
celebration of proportions and surface language that will
evolve in subsequent designs planned for presentation at
future autoshows this season. In other words, design first,
engineering later at this point in the process, in contrast
to the classic ‘form-follows-function’ approach.
Adds van den Acker, “It’s
important to start with the vision first: Nagare is
sculpture on wheels, our vision of what Mazda automobiles
could look like in 2020. The concept we’ll present in
Detroit is practical enough to produce in the next decade,
while the model under development for Geneva will embody
design ideas we expect to implement in the very near
future.”
PACKAGE
Like all Mazda products,
Nagare has the soul of a sports car. Its shape is sleek and
aerodynamically efficient, as you’d expect of an urban
cruiser for the future. Wheels are positioned at the far
corners of the envelope for quick steering response and
agile maneuverability. There isn’t an ounce of overhang
wasted.
Access to the four-place
interior is provided by two double-length doors that
hinge forward and up like the wings of a butterfly. The
driver is centrally located, like a single-seat sports
racer, for optimum control and visibility. Since the driver
is positioned under the highest portion of the roof, there’s
ample headroom with a comfortably reclined backrest.
Innovative seating arrangements are a Mazda specialty, as
witnessed by the successful RX-8 four-passenger sports car
and the clever packaging in the upcoming CX-9 three-row,
seven-passenger crossover sport-utility vehicle.
Nagare’s rear compartment is a
wrap-around lounge offering relaxed accommodations for three
passengers. The central front seat and expansive door opening
facilitate easy entry to the surprisingly roomy interior.
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Recognizing that an advanced design
concept needs an advanced powertrain, Nagare could conceivably
be powered by a hydrogen-fueled rotary engine. Mazda’s work on this
advanced driveline technology is among the most advanced in the
world, with hydrogen/gasoline-fueled rotaries powering RX-8s
currently in service in Japan.
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Nagare’s side surfaces
provide a means of visualizing the air flowing along and
over the car as it speeds through the atmosphere. Light and
shadow combine to convey this feeling of motion even when
the car is still. Similar hints of fluid flow are evident in
the hood, wheel arches, LED head- and tail-lamp treatments.
The same surface language plays throughout Nagare’s
interior; the instrument panel, center console, and door
panels all appear to be influenced by flow.
Notes von Holzhausen of the
vehicle, “Beauty is not a clean sheet of paper. Nagare’s
motion-influenced surface texture compliments its dynamic
attributes. Because of Mazda’s sporty essence, we never wrap
our customers in boxes.
“Our new surface language is
car-centric. After studying the architectural approach, which tends
to be strictly rigid, and the organic approach, which is highly
fluid, we created Nagare to straddle those two disciplines. It is
fluid, graceful, and dynamic. But the message it registers on the
beholder is flow-motion.”
GLOBAL DESIGN EFFORT
To give Mazda products sold in
far-flung global markets a common design theme, the three global
design studios, located in Irvine, California, Frankfurt, Germany
and Yokohama, Japan are inspired, guided, and encouraged by Laurens
van den Acker, the firm’s global design director, located at the
company’s headquarters in Hiroshima, Japan. Future concepts
embracing the Nagare flow design discipline will evolve under van
den Acker’s oversight as this year’s show season unfolds.
