MINI – Driven To Write

Newsgrab

A highly selective, subjective (and lengthy) IAA-themed grab for the week ending 12/09/2021.

The first indoor European motorshow since the onset of SARS CoV-2 is not something to be taken lightly, but neither is it of direct consequence to those of us who routinely fail to attend them. It’s not that I was ever particularly averse – in fact I rather enjoy perusing the putative, spectating over the speculative and free-associating over the fantastical, but the events themselves always seemed to have fallen at an inconvenient time. For the past 18 months or so this has been largely academic, but once again my coverage of a major motor event must by necessity be of a remote nature.

Impartial, in-person coverage is of course what anyone with a modicum of discernment would ideally Continue reading “Newsgrab”

Flattening the Curve

Simplify and add… marketing.

It might seem like a lifetime ago, but it was only last September when Volkswagen unveiled its new logo at the Frankfurt Motor Show. The logo was launched in conjunction with the ID.3 EV and was intended to herald a new era for the company, where the wholesale electrification of its model range would take centre stage. Unspoken, but undoubtedly the case, was the hope that it would Continue reading “Flattening the Curve”

Life After Munich

A group of high-profile designers have left BMW’s design studios over the past few years. Time to assess whose loss turned into whose gain.

Designer Interview: Adrian van Hooydonk, Director Design, BMW Cars — Happier times: Chris Bangle amid his brand chief designers. (l-r): David Robb (BMW Motorrad), Ulf Weidhase (BMW M & Individual), Ian Cameron (Rolls-Royce), Adrian van Hooydonk (BMW), Gerd Hildebrandt (Mini), photo (c) Car Design News

This photo, taken in about 2006, depicts BMW Group design at the height of its creative powers. Unlike giants such as Ford, GM or VAG, BMW achieved the seemingly impossible in running each of the company’s core brands (BMW, Mini, Rolls-Royce) as a creatively self-sufficient unit. For that reason, a Mini didn’t come across like a de-contented BMW, nor did anybody mistake a Rolls-Royce for a tarted-up 7 series. Every BMW brand’s design possessed its own set of stylistic rules and values.

More than a decade later, none of the people depicted in the photo are in charge any more – apart of course from Adrian van Hooydonk, who’s been running BMW Group’s design fortunes for a decade this year.

The last two years of that reign have been somewhat overshadowed by an unprecedented creative drain though – unprecedented not just regarding BMW Group, but within the industry as a whole. With the Bavarians’ stylistic fortunes currently shrouded in controversy, it would appear to be the right time to Continue reading “Life After Munich”

Summer Reissue – Champagne Supernova

This weekend sees our editor in-chief in celebratory mood…

I’m pleased to inform our regular readers that no hats were lost in the creation of this article. However, what millinery there was to hand has been at least metaphorically cast skywards in honour of my erstwhile fellow-DTW antagonist’s departure earlier this week across the Irish Sea. He means well, but our Mr. Doyle I find, is best appreciated from the distance of several hundred nautical miles.

But let us not Continue reading “Summer Reissue – Champagne Supernova”

A Photo For Sunday: Peugeot 404

When this series began first I used stock photos. Since then, I have switched to ones I have taken myself (or have been sent by our local correspondents). Today, I revert to stock images but with good reason.

The photo above is from the John Hinde collection: “To mark St Patrick’s Day, the Photographers’ Gallery in London is releasing newly restored pictures of rural Ireland in the 1950s and 1960s by a pioneer of British and Irish postcard art, John Hinde”. St Patrick’s Day was yesterday. The photo shows the Bloody Foreland, in County Donegal, Ireland and is one the earliest photos published by the John Hinde Studio.

What the John Hinde Studios did was to Continue reading “A Photo For Sunday: Peugeot 404”

Crossed Over

The recent crop of new models coming from Munich inevitably leads to a simple question: What on Earth has been going on at BMW in recent years?

2018-bmw-x4-rear-three-quarter-shot — Backside design, photo (c) suvauthority.com

Ever since the Neue Klasse reinvented and saved the brand, BMW could only ever, leaving matters such as personal taste aside, be described as assertive.

Assertively conservative insofar as an adherence to driven rear wheels, straight six engines and the evolution of the themes established by the Neue Klasse were concerned. Assertively daring when it comes to Continue reading “Crossed Over”

A Concept Car For Sunday

Today we take a small look at the future as imagined by students at Clemson University and the Art Centre College of Design.

The car is the Deep Orange 7 Mini concept, the result of a project carried out in co-operation with BMW. Many who liked the Mini Spiritual concept will find much to admire. For a start, it doesn’t look much like a Mini or a Mini. Continue reading “A Concept Car For Sunday”

Mountains And Dales, Oh, My Quickening Heart

Industrial designers often personify their target market customers as personas. Meet Antonella again.

As we know, the Ford Fiesta’s archetypal customer is “Antonella”. According to Ford she’s left home now and wants her Fiesta plusher, pricier and something else beginning with p. The question is should Ford Continue reading “Mountains And Dales, Oh, My Quickening Heart”

Something Small in Denmark

Alas this little gem is a bit too far away to take a look. All interesting cars are a long way from where I live (Aarhus).

You can inspect the advertisement here.

This one is the special De Tomaso sports model with 72 hp from the ex-BMC 1275 A-series engine. It has some special additions such as a different bumper, a bonnet scoop and some purposeful black detailing. Continue reading “Something Small in Denmark”

Small Means Yellow

This is a celebration of yellow.

Once upon a time colour and a car’s size had little relationship. These days yellow is the colour of small and cute. I gathered these over the closing months and have assembled them to celebrate yellow. Continue reading “Small Means Yellow”

Theme: Places – Oxford, Cambridge, Blenheim, Hereford, Somerset

Indeed. Quite a list of destinations for the person interested in cars named after UK places.

And they don’t do that anymore, do they? Yet the Americans are still happily driving around in Aspens, Tahoes, Malibus and Colorados. Seat, to my knowledge still sell an Ibiza, Ateca and Leon. The French and Germans are less willing to use their place names for their products, are they not? Continue reading “Theme: Places – Oxford, Cambridge, Blenheim, Hereford, Somerset”

One Or Two, Asks Henry From Derbyshire

We might be one of the least influential car websites but we are responsive. Sam the Eagle raised the question yesterday. This is the answer.

The start point of the discussion is a fictional letter (sent by post, imagine!) from a fictional reader, Henry. Henry is based in northwest Derbyshire and sells office furniture cleaner. He wants to Continue reading “One Or Two, Asks Henry From Derbyshire”

Far From the mainstream: Chatenet

Since 1984 the French firm Chatenet have been selling a tiny number of tiny cars.

At the moment there are 35 of these cars for sale. What do we find if we

Continue reading “Far From the mainstream: Chatenet”

What Anders Did Next

Last month’s news of head of MINI design Anders Warming’s precipitate and unexplained departure from BMW as was a shock to the industry comparable to Chris Bangle’s exit in 2009.

BORGWARD Group AG - Anders Warming — Image: Borgward AG

That may be as nothing compared with the news of his new appointment as Borgward AG’s Board of Management member responsible for Design, to begin on 1 January 2017. He is belatedly reversing the trend begun by Wilhelm Heinrich Gieschen, Karl Monz, and numerous others who took the one-way journey south from Bremen in the early 1960’s to create the new BMW in Borgward’s image. Except of course, neue Borgward is headquartered in Stuttgart, and answers to Beijing. Continue reading “What Anders Did Next”

Matters of a Spiritual Nature

It’s Sunday and in keeping with our unofficial Mini theme, DTW suggests four good reasons BMW was correct not to proceed with Rover’s 1995 Spiritual concept.

The 1995 Mini Spiritual twins first shown in 1997. Image via smallblogv8/MVerks — The futuristic 1995 Mini Spiritual twins first shown in 1997. Image via smallblogv8/MVerks

It would have cost a fortune to develop:
The investment in a bespoke floorpan and drivetrain, modifying hydragas, body & interior tooling and of course refitting the factory to build it would have been huge. New concepts also mean teething problems, so warranty costs were likely to have been high. Even as a sales success, Spiritual would struggle to recoup its development costs, meaning Rover would most likely have lost £millions on it.

Continue reading “Matters of a Spiritual Nature”

The Bavarian Job – 1993 BMW Z13

BMW’s early ’90s attempt at blowing the bloody doors off…

BMW's Mini-like Z13 - image via pixshark — BMW’s Mini-like Z13 – image: pixshark

It’s been suggested that BMW management pushed through the decision to build an overtly sporting concept of Mini against the wishes of Rover engineers, who advocated a more radical approach. There is a nub of truth in this, but only a nub. With Mini’s centre of gravity shifting towards the sporting Cooper model, Rover engineers had been working on Minki, a heavily re-engineered version of the existing car, aimed not only at modernising the concept, but in effect refocusing it. Continue reading “The Bavarian Job – 1993 BMW Z13”

Fossil Traces: From Minki to MINI

Before MINI, there was Minki.

Minki schematic - Minki 2 featured a longer and wider body. Image via Austin Memories. — Minki 1 schematic – Minki 2 featured a longer and wider body. Image via Austin Memories.

You’re probably never heard of it, and nor had I until comparatively recently. Minki was a Rover K-Series engined Mini re-engineered with interconnected hydragas suspension, much like that of Dr Alex Moulton’s own modified Mini – and a hatchback. Built to suggest a possible developmental direction for the ageing original, time ran out for the concept, given Mini’s possible sales volumes versus the costs involved. Continue reading “Fossil Traces: From Minki to MINI”

Champagne Supernova

We assess BMW’s millennial MINI remaster.

P0008757 — If Cool Britannia was a car. (c) bestcarmag

There has always been a faint whiff of the tribute act about Oasis, a nagging sense that it was all somewhat better the first time around. Similarly, despite the overwhelmingly positive reviews and its promising technical specification, I greeted BMW’s R50 MINI with a sizeable measure of ambivalence. However, owing to frequent use of a 2006-edition MINI Cooper on regular trips to Ireland, it’s a car I have come to know well, so has more intimate acquaintance with BMW-Rover’s retro recasting led me to Continue reading “Champagne Supernova”

Theme: Secondhand – MINI

I should probably have offered these thoughts whilst we were discussing ‘retro’, but a recent article on another site made me reflect on the plight of Mini, or should that be MINI?

4 generations of Mini/ MINI — Four generations of Mini/ MINI: http://www.caricos.com

I’ll dive straight in and state immediately that I abhor what BMW has done to the design of the Mini. If ever there was a lesson as to what can go wrong with second-hand design, this has to be it. When I see one of the latest generation 3 door hatches (to mention the 5 door would be more gratuitous, but unfair because there never was a 5 door version of Issigonis’s original) something stirs within me, and it’s not nice. Continue reading “Theme: Secondhand – MINI”

Theme : Benchmarks – Lost In Translation

Let’s re-create a winner. What could go wrong?

Motoring history has many concepts and show cars that disappointed when they were turned into production models, but equally tantalising are the occasions when a manufacturer has looked back into its own history and tried to re-create one of its own supposed ‘classics’.

This is sometimes commercially successful, sometimes critically successful, but those of us in the world of motoring who spend our time considering the automotive equivalent of fitting angels onto pin heads are usually frustrated. Here are some of my own personal disappointments and maybe a success or two. Continue reading “Theme : Benchmarks – Lost In Translation”