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Celebrated Italian design and automotive magnate Paolo Pininfarina passes away aged 65

2024-04-09T19:07:00-04:00

Paolo Pininfarina, the Italian business leader credited with expanding his family’s automotive enterprise into architecture and other areas of the design field, has died in Turin at the age of 65. The Pininfarina Chairman was known as a visionary who designed more than 600 cars after completing his engineering studies at the Polytechnic University in his home city.

"On behalf of the Board of Directors, the Board of Statutory Auditors, and all Pininfarina employees, I express deep sorrow and condolences for the loss of our dear Chairman," Pininfarina's CEO, Silvio Angori, said in a press release.

Light Towers by Pininfarina in Mérida, Mexico. Image courtesy Pininfarina

"We are all extremely grateful to Eng. Pininfarina for his extraordinary contribution to the company and for always passionately advocating for our history and corporate identity both in terms of style and ethical and behavioral choices," his statement continued. "I am personally grateful to him for confirming me in th...

Marchi Architectes designs a portable home inspired by a concept car

2020-08-07T13:50:00-04:00

In response to a competition held be Renault back in 2016 for new automotive-inspired architecture and design, French-based design studio Marchi Architectes submitted the first place entry. Called the Renault Symbioz House 33, the architects designed a portable home inspired by Renault's concept car, the Symbioz. The home fully integrates the Symbioz, treating it as a natural extension of the spatial aspects of the interior space.

The 21-meter-long rectangular structure rises a subtle 7 meters in height. Utilizing three primary materials: steel, glass, and wood, the home maintains a minimalist quality that accentuates texture and transparency.

The lower main level holds all of the living spaces including the living and kitchen areas. The upper-level holds the bedroom and bathroom. However, the dwelling's defining feature is its mobile room, which is Renault's Symbioz concept car. The vehicle can park on a movable platform that enables it to move through the architecture's two levels...

Cobe to create new automotive design center in Sweden

2020-05-21T18:38:00-04:00

Copenhagen-based architecture firm Cobe will create the new 14,000-square-meter design center for global automaker Geely in Gothenburg, Sweden. Set for completion in 2022, the new center will house Geely Design, the design and development arm for the Chinese automotive company. The building will function as a site for the development of the new electric car brand Lynk & Co.

The design center will be named Un3 by Geely and be a multi-purpose structure rising four-stories high. The ground-level contains a showroom that can be accessed through a large public square. The middle levels contain a small eating area, meeting rooms, and offices. And finally, the top floor contains the "Chamber of Secrets," a completely sealed off space where designers are free to work on the latest innovations and ideas without fear of the prying eyes of the public.

The top level contains a sunken yard that also acts as the glass ceiling for the atrium of the lower levels. The yard creates a space for design...

Automotive showroom by Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects unifies car and home

2018-03-01T10:43:00-05:00

Danish architectural firm Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects has completed the first phase of NIO House, an unconventional showroom for electric car company NIO in Shanghai.

NIO House by Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects located in Shanghai. Image: Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects.

The firm utilizes materials such as satin stainless steel, Douglas fir, terrazzo, and fabrics to further NIO's message of the car as an extension of the home. NIO House is part of the company's design-centric concept bringing home and car together in the showroom itself.

NIO House by Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects located in Shanghai. Image: Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects.

The car manufacturer’s ES8 and EP9 models are on display in an environment that allows the consumer to understand and exper...

Renault issues Coupé Corbusier: a concept car to explore "a new way forward", inspired by Le Corbusier

2015-10-26T13:12:00-04:00

Le Corbusier, who died 50 years ago, is widely recognised as one of the founding fathers of modern architecture. Renault tells us this long, chamfered concept was “inspired by the architect’s modernist principles and theories”, and references the “golden era of the automobile of the 1930s”. Top Gear is no historical expert, but does not remember seeing anything like the Corbusier concept in photos from the Thirties.

Would Le Corbusier have chosen "suicide doors"? Renault whipped up the design for part of an exhibition put on by Centre des Monuments Nationaux in France, “Cars for living: the automobile and modernism in the 20th and 21st centuries,” which focuses on the history and legacy of the heyday of French automotive manufacturing in the 1930s. No word yet as to how it actually drives.

The Coupé doesn't seem to take much from Le Corbusier's Minimum Car, which exists only as sketches, and was born out the architect's obsession with the manufacturable precision of the automobile industry.

h/t Highsnobiety

More on the ongoing influence of Le Corbusier: