I swear as long as I exist on this cursed rock, I’m going to be writing something about BMW design every year or so. In thirty years’ time Torch, by then a Futurama-style head in a pickle jar, and David, having successfully uploaded his consciousness into his i3, will shock me via my Autopian staff compliance collar for yet another article. Ravaged by years of baked bean abuse I find myself hunched over an ancient flickering laptop, forced to comply to pay my hourly Adobe subscription bill. Honestly, the situations I get myself into for money.
Way back at the end of 2021 I wrote about the XM Concept (as it mercifully was back then) for the insurance company. Not quite a year later, Miss Mercedes stuck a poster of Chris Bangle on her garage wall, placed a few small candles underneath it, and declared him BMW’s best designer. Needless to say I had thoughts about that bout of insanity. Then I discussed the design of the slightly heavy-handed look of the newly released M2. A respite, but by September 2023, courtesy of our friends at BMW UK I spent a week behind the wheel of an M240ixDrive. I adored the car but because Car Design Twitter had coughed up another round of thirty-year-old BMW genuflection, I felt compelled to crowbar a mini rant into the review.
Since then I’ve taken a deep dive into the design of the i3 on David’s behalf and, click whore that I am, wrote about the E30 for my Damn Good Design Series. I make that six separate pieces about BMW in the last two and a half years. And now I’m about to repeat the whole debasing exercise again. I’m either a masochist or one of the Quandt family keeps a voodoo doll of me in their desk.
Why Do We Care So Much About BMW?
This all begs the question: why do I keep doing this? A better question is, why do I keep getting the opportunity to do it? Obviously, I’m not going to turn down the chance to swan about in fifty grand’s worth of purple press car for a week, but that aside how is it that BMW manages to dominate so much of the car design discourse? A major part of it is the esteem in which nearly every BMW made from about 1976 until 2006 continues to be held in.
For a section of online car culture tastemakers these BMWs are a collection of touchstones that define what constitutes the enthusiast uber-maschine: analog controls, normally aspirated power going to the rear, thousands of discreet options and chassis codes that allow those in the know to craft a perfect build like they’re gearing up for an MMORPG raid. If you don’t get this, or don’t agree with it then you are clearly not a True Car Enthusiast. They simply can’t shut their yaps about them. It bolsters their assumed credibility, keeps the insiders in and the outsiders out. It must be guarded, protected and blurted out of a loud hailer every time a new BMW is launched, because if they don’t the whole fabric of their being is torn asunder like the fallacy it is.
And it is a fallacy, because saying well ackchyually what BMW should really be doing, is releasing a car like the E30. Why? Why should they do that great BMW Know-It-All? Those cars are now forty years old. Their capabilities are about as relevant to today’s automotive market as a starting handle or paraffin headlamps. A forty-year-old BMW in 1985 would have had two wheels, or wings and a propellor. Those cars were the epitome of solid (and often sideways) Teutonic virtue, but like the Blaupunkt often found nestled in their center consoles, their best time has gone. You cannot keep looking to the past because companies, markets and customers change and evolve over time. No matter how shrill the cries from the BMW neckbeards get, the company continues to sell more cars than ever every year. Clearly they are getting most things mostly right.
The problems have arisen because when BMW has got it wrong, they got it really wrong. Their worst crimes are twofold. The iX is a horrific-looking thing, no matter how well it drives. And the XM is even worse. These fractal monstrosities seem to exist on a different plane, a glitch slightly out of phase with the rest of the automotive universe. Here’s what I had to say when David admitted to quite liking it back in January last year:
“Readers, I think all this worrying about moving has reformatted David’s head, rewriting the bit that controls the eyesight. I mean, I know he wears glasses but I had assumed as he can drive his optical cortex was functioning somewhat, but it appears not. There’s so much wrong with the appearance of the iX it’s hard to know where to direct the spleen juice first. Remember when you were little and tried on your dad’s suit? That’s what the body of the iX is like. Flabby and oversized and creased in all the wrong places. There’s competing shapes fighting each other all over the place, the wheel arch flats are stolen from a completely different car making it look under wheeled and the C pillar is all wrong. There’s corners where there should be curves and the whole thing shrieks of inconsistency inside and out. The color ways are bad, the wheels are terrible and there is not one thing I can find about this eyesore that I like. Put the entire production run into a burlap sack and chuck it into the Danube so no-one should ever have to gaze upon the horror ever again.”
They’re Just Bad Design
The issue isn’t just that these designs are not visually attractive, it’s been the arrogance of the company in promoting them, and in particular head of BMW Design Domagoj Dukec, in his insistence that BMW are right and everybody else is wrong. In a paid editorial puff piece shamelessly published by Esquire, he states:
“What I try to teach everyone who is not a designer is that good design is not about pretty or ugly. These things are subjective. What is pretty? You will never design anything that 100% of people will like. It’s not possible, because people have such different tastes and needs. So it’s not about taste, but about gauging what a customer actually desires, or what they could desire in the future.”
I think Dieter Rams might have something to say about that. The third of his Ten Principles for Good Design is: Good Design is aesthetic. To add to that I’ll repeat something I wrote for my XM piece:
“In his book Emotional Design: Why we love (or hate) everyday things, Professor Donald Norman makes the case that our relationship with an object is initially determined by our visceral reaction to it. Are we attracted or repelled? Things we like the look of are more likely to have a positive emotional impact on us, and in turn we are more likely to engage with them”.
Going by that measure, customers have been repelled by the iX and the XM. The only model-by-model breakdown of sales figures I can find was on a BMWblog post reporting on the global sales of the XM in 2023. That contains a chart showing in the first nine months of that year, just 35,088 iXs and 4,450 XMs were sold.
You can point your internet browser to any number of online interviews with Dukec defending these cars, but the reality is their external design is very poor, no matter how much you try and spin it, intellectualize them, or vilify people for just not getting it. The hubris of that tactic is underlined by the following tweet, which to their eternal credit BMW haven’t deleted.
OK, Boomer.
And what’s your reason not to change?The first-ever BMW iX.https://t.co/NhWosxWcxK#NEXTGen #THEiX pic.twitter.com/5Fvndzlzvi
— BMW (@BMW) November 15, 2020
BMW doesn’t break the sales figures for models within a range down, so we don’t know how much the infamous beaver teeth version of the kidney grill has affected the four series and the M models they infect. What we do know is they were done deliberately at the behest of marketing. From the book BMW by Design by Steve Saxty:
..That need for distinction was something that board member for Sales and Marketing Ian Robertson was seeking in 2017 the G2x-generation of 3 and 4 Series cars was being designed. “The X Series SUV grilles were becoming twice the size of those on BMW sedans,” he says. “So we needed something different for the sportier cars. We looked at the aggressive grilles on the 3.0 CSL Hommage and I was the one who pushed for them to go onto the next 4 series because it helped differentiate the couple from the 3 series sedan. I debated it with [R&D boss] Klaus Fröhlich and we got so excited by the idea that we wondered if we could put them on the 8 Series too, but it was too late – a shame, because we could have positioned it differently too.”
The simple truth was that the 4 Series coupe looked far more assertive with a horizontal [I assume this is meant to be vertical – AC] treatment. Although it caused controversy amongst traditionalists, the car won over a new generation of younger buyers. Doing that is essential in a fashion-conscious area of the market. Let’s leave the last word to Ian Robertson, the man who pushed for the idea. “We might have lost some 4 Series buyers,” he says, “but we attracted far more. That’s our job – and I’d do the same thing again.”
Beaver teeth and hunchback even-numbered X models aside, the truth is the rest of the BMW range is mostly solidly handsome – now that I’ve seen and sat in the cyborg limo-of-the-future 7 series I quite like it, although along with most BMW models, it’s very color and trim dependent. Not outstanding, but I mentioned before the pre-Bangle era models were all considered conservative in their day.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat
So again, why are we having this discussion now? BMW’s latest effort, the Concept Skytop was revealed back in May at the Concorso d’Eleganza at the Grand Hotel Villa d’Este on Lake Como. The tedious online BMW design discourse has roused itself back into action, heaping praise on it for not having a hideous grill and being proof that BMW can design good looking cars when it tries. I did see one curious assessment praising it for having a Bangle Butt like the E63, which is something the Skytop very clearly does not possess.
Nonetheless, it’s a nicely considered, opulent open tourer with a hint of 71-74 Mustang around the side glass opening and sail panel. I think the lights are a bit shallow – this is in vogue at the moment but it makes the lit elements look a bit lost in all the sheet metal on the front and rear fasciae, and the front cheek surface between the headlight and vent is doing too much work in too small a space. Compared to the front fender line the rear is much softer – I think more consistency between these two lines would help.
The thought I have been having for a few months now is that after the PR missteps of the various Dukec interviews, and the iX controversy, BMW has been making a concerted effort to rehabilitate their design image in the eyes of enthusiasts. What planted the seed for this in my cynical mind initially was the arrival on my doorstop at the end of last year of my (purchased with my own money) copy of BMW by Design, which provided much of the background for my E30 piece. Saxty’s previous books, Secret Fords, are very much the definitive design history of Ford design in Europe, detailing how various cars went from sketch to production and all the politics and corporate interference that entailed. BMW by Design is nothing like as in-depth–despite getting glowing reviews elsewhere, it’s far less critical than the Ford books, as I hope the passage quoted earlier demonstrates. It could never have been written without BMW’s help, and there is an ongoing book tour at BMW-centered events going on throughout the summer.
Money Talks
Think I’m being my usual bitter self? Over on the Supercar Blondie TikTok there’s been a spate of BMW-centric videos recently – including the eye-popping GINA, which was a genuinely influential concept during the time of Chris Bangle. It’s actually featured twice, along with the Vision Next 100, the Vision M Next, the 328 Hommage, the Touring Coupe, the CSL Hommage R, and of course the Skytop. I know this is partly how auto media works these days (although it doesn’t have to: you can support long form pieces like this by becoming a member here) but this is far more coverage than any other OEM has received (or rather granted). Still think I’m being cynical?
It’s been mentioned recently that due to its rapturous reception as something of a return to form, the Skytop is being considered for production. This has happened with previous concepts: The Vision M Next was due to be built based on an overhauled i8 platform – the work was all done until it was cancelled at the last gasp. BMW Group head of design Adrian van Hooydonk and Chief Engineer Markus Flasch pushed the board to put a previous Villa d’Este darling, the Touring Coupe into production, but were unsuccessful.
One that did succeed was the 3.0 CSL Hommage, which made it into production as the limited-run 3.0 CSL in 2022. Essentially a hand-built, carbon-bodied M4 with a manual gearbox and yellow headlights, fifty were built and sold out in weeks at a list price of €750,000 ($813k). RM Sotheby’s sold one with 33 miles on it for €1,017,500 ($1.1m). My suspicion is that if any of those specials had been made they would have been offered by BMW in a similar manner, and that if it makes production the Skytop will be as well. Clearly there are a lot of rabid BMW fans with very deep pockets hankering for the old days, and in some way I don’t begrudge BMW for doing this. There is always a ceiling as to how high a premium (as opposed to exotic or luxury) brand can reach. This is one way for Munich to access the wallets of High Net Worth Individuals.
So yes, BMW can and does design great-looking cars when it tries, but the ones that really curry your wurst won’t be priced at a level you, me or any of those raging shitpirates who worship the Luthe era cars, can afford. We’ll have to enjoy the good cars they currently make and hope they don’t make a hunde dinner of the neue Neue Klasse cars. Now how’s that for cynical?
All images courtesy of BMW Press Club
- Our Grumpy Professional Designer Pleads With BMW To Stop Obsessing Over The 1980s Already
- Why I’m Putting Away The Keys To My BMW i3s For A While To Enjoy My Gas Cars
- My Diabolical BMW Is Trying Its Hardest To Bankrupt Me
- The 2025 BMW 3 Series Gets The Subtlest Makeover Imaginable And Some New Engines
That’s such a spectacular first paragraph!
I’m glad they haven’t messed with the grill on the 3 series and that they still offer some great colors. The wife loves her ’21 330e in Portimao Blue with the M-Sport package.
First (and last) paragraphs are always the hardest for me to write.
Glad the missus likes her 330. Something about the traditional three series always rings truer for me over the four series, if that makes sense. More in keeping with the original idea rather than a more aggressive coupe. Always like the F30 myself, I really liked the DRG on those.
I think BMW does a great job making the wagons look ‘right’ – the F31 and G21 are both really good looking, and the E34 Touring still looks handsome 30 years later.
That’s such a spectacular first paragraph!
I’m glad they haven’t messed with the grill on the 3 series and that they still offer some great colors. The wife loves her ’21 330e in Portimao Blue with the M-Sport package.
First (and last) paragraphs are always the hardest for me to write.
Glad the missus likes her 330. Something about the traditional three series always rings truer for me over the four series, if that makes sense. More in keeping with the original idea rather than a more aggressive coupe. Always like the F30 myself, I really liked the DRG on those.
I think BMW does a great job making the wagons look ‘right’ – the F31 and G21 are both really good looking, and the E34 Touring still looks handsome 30 years later.
Part of the problem is how cars are photographed. Often from low pavement angle or just in ways they will never be viewed in real life. BMW could benefit from stylists that consider what the vehicle would look like hitched up to a tow truck or on a flat bed. Much more realistic
Part of the problem is how cars are photographed. Often from low pavement angle or just in ways they will never be viewed in real life. BMW could benefit from stylists that consider what the vehicle would look like hitched up to a tow truck or on a flat bed. Much more realistic
Thank you Adrian for the snarky reference to what Adobe is sure to do thirty years in the future re: hourly subscriptions. As an architect, we are hosed by the almighty Autodesk and forced to pay for the most ridiculous subscription fees packaged into a “suite” of software that we hardly even use – and there’s basically no innovation other than tweaking UI button icons every couple of years as justification for said “subscription” model of software “ownership”. They’ve even tried out pay per use subscriptions…
I’m extremely fortunate that as a lecturer I can access Autodesk software on an educators (ie free) license, even though at the moment I rarely use Alias.
Lol my god I hope not, but hourly subscriptions seems like such a thing they would do if they thought they could get away with it. I so wish someone would challenge adobe’s dominance in the creative tools space. Theres some really great UX tools now but none of those companies has branched into competing with Adobe on other types of creative software tools.
Thank you Adrian for the snarky reference to what Adobe is sure to do thirty years in the future re: hourly subscriptions. As an architect, we are hosed by the almighty Autodesk and forced to pay for the most ridiculous subscription fees packaged into a “suite” of software that we hardly even use – and there’s basically no innovation other than tweaking UI button icons every couple of years as justification for said “subscription” model of software “ownership”. They’ve even tried out pay per use subscriptions…
I’m extremely fortunate that as a lecturer I can access Autodesk software on an educators (ie free) license, even though at the moment I rarely use Alias.
Lol my god I hope not, but hourly subscriptions seems like such a thing they would do if they thought they could get away with it. I so wish someone would challenge adobe’s dominance in the creative tools space. Theres some really great UX tools now but none of those companies has branched into competing with Adobe on other types of creative software tools.
As long as we are talking aesthetics, what is going on with that header image? An entire letter is covered by the foreground graphic and I find it off-putting.
I was too lazy to do it so someone else did.
This is what you get when you outsource. To be fair, I never actually thought you did it. We know who does the header images most of the time.
Better Bimmers? Bitter Bimmers? Butter Bimmers?
You almost had it……
As long as we are talking aesthetics, what is going on with that header image? An entire letter is covered by the foreground graphic and I find it off-putting.
I was too lazy to do it so someone else did.
This is what you get when you outsource. To be fair, I never actually thought you did it. We know who does the header images most of the time.
Better Bimmers? Bitter Bimmers? Butter Bimmers?
You almost had it……
It wouldn’t take too much for the front end of the current 7-series to make a more explicit reference to some of Paul Bracq’s studies from the mid-70s, when he was trying to get rid of the shark nose.
I purposely picked the best version (the i7) for the image, but if I were in the studio sketching for the LCI it could certainly stand a little tidying up.
It wouldn’t take too much for the front end of the current 7-series to make a more explicit reference to some of Paul Bracq’s studies from the mid-70s, when he was trying to get rid of the shark nose.
I purposely picked the best version (the i7) for the image, but if I were in the studio sketching for the LCI it could certainly stand a little tidying up.
Only BMWs I ever really loved the looks of were the 328, 507, E9s, and M1 and they just make unreliable fancier Toyotas now, so it doesn’t really matter to me what they look like. Some other models were good, but nothing that really grabbed me. At one point, E9s were still fairly cheap and I thought about getting one, but from talking to people, it seemed they were more expensive and difficult to work on than a Ferrari 308 (about the same price at the time) and if I wasn’t super enthused about a 308, no way in hell I was going to bother with a BMW. I will say that I really like that emerald green they have. Someone has an M4 around here in that color and it’s fantastic.
Only BMWs I ever really loved the looks of were the 328, 507, E9s, and M1 and they just make unreliable fancier Toyotas now, so it doesn’t really matter to me what they look like. Some other models were good, but nothing that really grabbed me. At one point, E9s were still fairly cheap and I thought about getting one, but from talking to people, it seemed they were more expensive and difficult to work on than a Ferrari 308 (about the same price at the time) and if I wasn’t super enthused about a 308, no way in hell I was going to bother with a BMW. I will say that I really like that emerald green they have. Someone has an M4 around here in that color and it’s fantastic.
I bought an XM this week, it is beautiful but it going to take a lot of time and money to get going again. It is a Citroen that has been in a collection for twenty years.
The only XM in my book. Love them.
I bought an XM this week, it is beautiful but it going to take a lot of time and money to get going again. It is a Citroen that has been in a collection for twenty years.
The only XM in my book. Love them.
I remember thinking; Is that a commonly used design practice? when the stretched skin over wire-frame GINA made its debut. I could see it being a useful tool if you say you are limited to a production body in white, and want to try out alternate styles.
If you’re going to Futuramatize Torch, at least give him Bender.
There are images in BMW by Design of them doing exactly this.
Is it a common practice, or just BMW, and just that time frame?
No it’s not at all. That was how GINA became so influential. They made a frame and stretched fabric over it. They are the only ones to do it as far as I know, we wouldn’t need to do that now 3D software is so much more powerful.
Interesting. Even with great advancements in CAD, I could see merit in using easily modified full size wire frame and stretchable fabric to refine a design, add some foam under fabric in areas, scan it, then do clay model.
Like everything in the studio, it’s a time/resources thing. A company like BMW will have way more than we did, but they’ve got way more cars to design.
Has any software offered a “virtual clay” mode where using VR googles and gloves, you could sculpt a surface, and once saved would create the math data?
Yep, it’s called GravitySketchVR
Thanks, figured something of the sort must be available by now, wished for it in 1996.
Gravity sketch doesn’t give you anything Blender/Maya can’t do, it just uses VR as an interface. It’s not tremendously advanced in terms of what it can do, but it is gimmicky, eye-catching and of the moment.
It’s great for interiors, where heavily cheated sketches can lead to cramped spaces. It gives a good way to understand how a space will feel through the whole development process.
If cheated sketches are leading to cramped interiors then something is amiss in the workflow that it shouldn’t take Gravity Sketch to find.
ZBrush which is used for character creation.
Benderizing Torch?
Oh, boy.
I remember thinking; Is that a commonly used design practice? when the stretched skin over wire-frame GINA made its debut. I could see it being a useful tool if you say you are limited to a production body in white, and want to try out alternate styles.
If you’re going to Futuramatize Torch, at least give him Bender.
There are images in BMW by Design of them doing exactly this.
Is it a common practice, or just BMW, and just that time frame?
No it’s not at all. That was how GINA became so influential. They made a frame and stretched fabric over it. They are the only ones to do it as far as I know, we wouldn’t need to do that now 3D software is so much more powerful.
Interesting. Even with great advancements in CAD, I could see merit in using easily modified full size wire frame and stretchable fabric to refine a design, add some foam under fabric in areas, scan it, then do clay model.
Like everything in the studio, it’s a time/resources thing. A company like BMW will have way more than we did, but they’ve got way more cars to design.
Has any software offered a “virtual clay” mode where using VR googles and gloves, you could sculpt a surface, and once saved would create the math data?
Yep, it’s called GravitySketchVR
Thanks, figured something of the sort must be available by now, wished for it in 1996.
Gravity sketch doesn’t give you anything Blender/Maya can’t do, it just uses VR as an interface. It’s not tremendously advanced in terms of what it can do, but it is gimmicky, eye-catching and of the moment.
It’s great for interiors, where heavily cheated sketches can lead to cramped spaces. It gives a good way to understand how a space will feel through the whole development process.
If cheated sketches are leading to cramped interiors then something is amiss in the workflow that it shouldn’t take Gravity Sketch to find.
ZBrush which is used for character creation.
Benderizing Torch?
Oh, boy.
I am happy to be the grumpy old man driving a 2002.
They’re lovely things, but not what BMW should be doing now.
Well of course not. What modern buyer would want a spartan and efficient SEDAN, even if it is a masterclass in packaging and handling? I had to add a Bluetooth radio just to get my niece to ride in it.
I had to add a Bluetooth radio just to get my niece to ride in it.
Well yeah, what’s the fun of being a passenger in one of those? An old BMW SEDAN may be fun to drive but not so much fun to be driven in.
(FWIW I find kids prefer minivans. So much more room for friend and crap.
If a 2002 was about $5500 in 1973 that’s $39k in today’s money. A base three is not much more than that.
My 2002 (not a tii) was almost $8000 in 1976! It was purchased by a physician in Florida with every option including air conditioning. Great car, bad deal.
Yes they were always expensive cars, which is something a lot of people seem to miss.
I am happy to be the grumpy old man driving a 2002.
They’re lovely things, but not what BMW should be doing now.
Well of course not. What modern buyer would want a spartan and efficient SEDAN, even if it is a masterclass in packaging and handling? I had to add a Bluetooth radio just to get my niece to ride in it.
I had to add a Bluetooth radio just to get my niece to ride in it.
Well yeah, what’s the fun of being a passenger in one of those? An old BMW SEDAN may be fun to drive but not so much fun to be driven in.
(FWIW I find kids prefer minivans. So much more room for friend and crap.
If a 2002 was about $5500 in 1973 that’s $39k in today’s money. A base three is not much more than that.
My 2002 (not a tii) was almost $8000 in 1976! It was purchased by a physician in Florida with every option including air conditioning. Great car, bad deal.
Yes they were always expensive cars, which is something a lot of people seem to miss.
BMW has become the reality-design show contestant who argues that nobody understands their talent when culled from the show after presenting a succession of garments that are ill-fitting, unflattering, bizarre colors, using inappropriate fabrics and are poorly finished.
Yet the the contestant still wins in the end? Because that’s BMW’s story – a whole lot of winning, whether you like it or not.
BMW has become the reality-design show contestant who argues that nobody understands their talent when culled from the show after presenting a succession of garments that are ill-fitting, unflattering, bizarre colors, using inappropriate fabrics and are poorly finished.
Yet the the contestant still wins in the end? Because that’s BMW’s story – a whole lot of winning, whether you like it or not.
Not to be too disagreeable, but to my eyes this design is better in the same way as how you feel on the second day after you discover you’re going to survive ebola relative to how you felt on the first day. It’s going to be a long recovery.
Not to be too disagreeable, but to my eyes this design is better in the same way as how you feel on the second day after you discover you’re going to survive ebola relative to how you felt on the first day. It’s going to be a long recovery.
So I bought an (used) iX a few months back. I went into it thinking that its controversial looks may actually help me in getting a good deal. It probably did. Now, maybe I’m used it, and I think the interior has always been great (just wish it had more physical buttons), but I think it actually looks OK now.
The XM on the other hand is horrendous.
And… yes, the neue klasse cars look better, but at least BMW is trying to do something different.
We all buy cars for different reasons, and if it works for you then great. But visually it’s an abortion.
I mean even ugly children have parents that think they are beautiful 🙂
I do think that one of the weird things to me about the iX is that a lot of the small details in the body work are very well done, the paint quality is clearly better than average to my eye. There’s a lot of stuff they clearly went above and beyond on them even if I can’t bring myself to really like the overall looks. And the interior from what I’ve seen in photos and videos is genuinely innovative and attractive.
Yeah, I actually really like the car, and a lot of thought went into it. It’s got a unique structure with a bit of CFRP, and was built as an EV from the start. For what I need, it’s perfect. I mean, I did make sure my wife was OK with us getting an “objectively ugly car” before I pulled the trigger :).
Lol I mentioned to my wife I thought a used i3 would be a great daily for me and she looked at my with that quizzical look like a bug just flew out of my mouth 😀
To me the tragedy of the iX is that they could’ve taken all that thoughtful build and engineering and wrapped it in a less controversial form and had a real hit on their hands.
So I bought an (used) iX a few months back. I went into it thinking that its controversial looks may actually help me in getting a good deal. It probably did. Now, maybe I’m used it, and I think the interior has always been great (just wish it had more physical buttons), but I think it actually looks OK now.
The XM on the other hand is horrendous.
And… yes, the neue klasse cars look better, but at least BMW is trying to do something different.
We all buy cars for different reasons, and if it works for you then great. But visually it’s an abortion.
I mean even ugly children have parents that think they are beautiful 🙂
I do think that one of the weird things to me about the iX is that a lot of the small details in the body work are very well done, the paint quality is clearly better than average to my eye. There’s a lot of stuff they clearly went above and beyond on them even if I can’t bring myself to really like the overall looks. And the interior from what I’ve seen in photos and videos is genuinely innovative and attractive.
Yeah, I actually really like the car, and a lot of thought went into it. It’s got a unique structure with a bit of CFRP, and was built as an EV from the start. For what I need, it’s perfect. I mean, I did make sure my wife was OK with us getting an “objectively ugly car” before I pulled the trigger :).
Lol I mentioned to my wife I thought a used i3 would be a great daily for me and she looked at my with that quizzical look like a bug just flew out of my mouth 😀
To me the tragedy of the iX is that they could’ve taken all that thoughtful build and engineering and wrapped it in a less controversial form and had a real hit on their hands.
It’s a shame that out of any design element, the kidney grille is the hill they’re absolutely gonna die on, since I think it translates horribly to both electric cars and giant SUV fronts. The customer segment they look like they’re designing for today is “something to buy for your do-nothing kid to do donuts in the courthouse parking lot after your lawyer gets him acquitted for his sixth DUI”.
It’s such an iconic thing and there’s so much you can do with it, without making it so ridiculously oversized. Every OEM would kill for a visual trademark like that.