“Make something extra-special that refutes all blandness.” This was the message delivered to the team involved in project ‘Z06’. Work began in June 1994 in the heart of the ‘Advanced Design’ department, directed by Jean-François Venet under the authority of Patrick Le Quément. During the preliminary stage, which translated into a host of sketches, a dozen designers were involved. After a first review, four proposals were retained for 3D development and four small-scale models were built for the final selection held in July 1994. The definitive choice went for the project by Florian Thiercelin.
Prototype construction was assigned to the G-Studio labs tucked between the haze of Turin and the first bulwarks of the Alps. Founded in 1980 by Arrigo Gallizio and Pierangelo Maffiodo, G-Studio is one of those Piedmontese ateliers that puts its know-how at the service of the big constructors.
The exterior design of the Initiale is indisputably distinctive. The aim of the designers was to reconcile humanism and technology, distinction and modernity, quality and innovation, emotion and simplicity. In short, they had to avoid all the crass excesses of luxury: the brass, the pretention, the froth.
They also had to excise all reference to the past and thus avoid the perspective of a sterile or disenchanted post-modernism.At the end of day, the exterior style of Initiale is strong and personal. Its silhouette is deliberately two-box, a way of stating the concept car’s affiliation with all upper-range Renaults.
The taut flanks, delicately shaped, give it poise, the proportions presence. Structured volumes inspire robustness, while very emphatic wings translate the power. The front elevation is unexpected, bare and yet distinguished. Its subdued aggression only hints at the presence of a V10 engine behind the incisive prow, a discreet symbol of the 40 CV.
The treatment of the rear end is no less surprising. There is the confluence of superstructure and body that confers on it its personality. The canopy prolongs the immense windscreen then dies away at the edges of the rear hatch. In closing, it espouses the curvature of an ogive. The hatch is of an all-new type.
Different from a traditional tailgate, it does not englobe the rear screen but opens in a complex movement by virtue of a patented mechanism. It slips forward, covering the glass, enabling access to the boot without extending upwards. Each detail became the object of attention, as testifies the vertical headlight design and the strange impression given by the headlamp lenses and rear lights or the pattern of the wheels.
Initiale defends the image of rapid and comfortable individual transport, exalting, quite simply, the appeal of the journey. The furniture is composed of four welcoming, soft and enveloping armchairs, seating known as ‘variometric’ developed in collaboration with Bertrand Faure. At the front, both seats automatically pivot slightly (by 20_) towards the exterior to facilitate on board installation.
At front and rear alike, a con-sole is positioned between the two armchairs. In the boot, a lockable oddments drawer allows one’s more precious effects to be concealed. In the palette used by the designers in charge of colours and materials, there exist ineffable codes. For a luxury car, their dilemma consists in innovating everything while acknowledging the obligatory references. Wood and leather are not employed here in conformist spirit.
The furniture is composed of four welcoming, soft and enveloping armchairs, seating known as ‘variometric’ developed in collaboration with Bertrand Faure. At the front, both seats automatically pivot slightly (by 20°) towards the exterior to facilitate on board installation.
The designers went for a light colour and classic harmonies: natural hues, of ochre wood and beige leather, espouse navy blue. The choice of a mottled and silky-looking maple cleanses itself of the sombre and varnished veneers (mahogany or walnut) currently employed in interiors. The wood clads the dashboard but also the shells of the armchairs. Seats and door panels are covered in beige buckskin while a discreet navy-blue band skirts the entire cabin, circumbscribing it. The hideaway glove box, lined with a checked and silky brick-coloured fabric, winks an eye at coachbuilders of yore who secreted hidden compartments in their alcoves. The same fabric is to be found in the tidy bins located in the doors and the luggage compartment drawer.
Rather than chromed steel or aluminium, the designers preferred to experiment with the decorative potential of titanium, a warm and dark-hued metal. Initiale is based on a new platform that declares impressive dimensions: 3.02 m wheelbase, 1.66 m front track, 1.63 m rear track. The layout is conventional with the engine in longitudinal front position. The V10 is coupled to a semi-auto hydraulic clutch and six-speed sequential gearbox.
The article continues in Auto & Design no. 94
