As you move towards that big yellow silhouette shining in its gold-pigment-enhanced paint, one comment can be heard rising from the team standing around it: “It’s a concept, but it’s 80% definitive. The production car will amaze you when you see how faithful it remains to this concept”. A statement of this kind might sound rather bold in relation to the idea of rationality and qualitative solidity in which the Skoda image has been imbued for years.
But at the Mladá Boleslav style centre, work has long been underway on a transition to projects that may retain an innate vocation for practicality but at the same time take on board more emotional formal content: the first expression of the new course is the next Octavia, scheduled for the end of 2019.
Pending this, the Vision iV prototype offers us a glimpse of an all-electric crossover (coming in 2020) whose proportions are directly linked to the mechanical layout, but above all plays with surfaces and details capable of lending a certain scenic impact.
“We are particularly proud of the new grille with its illuminated profile because it pays homage to our long history while being much more modern”, explains Omer Halilhodzic, who was involved in the exterior design. “The functional elements have also been integrated, proving very attractive aesthetically; examples are the fins that make the large 22” wheels more aerodynamic”.
Added to this is the traditional use of sharp creases on the panels, here more suited than elsewhere to emphasise the waistline. The project also focuses on a reshaped and strongly three-dimensional front architecture, an incisive evolution of what is already visible on the most recent Škodas. “All this to try and trigger the so-called “wow effect” while remaining faithful to our principles”, concludes Halilhodzic.
The interior, traditional expression of the brand’s attention to functionality, reveals an unexpected green aspiration: “You might even say it’s vegan,” says Andrea Jensen, head of colour and trim.
(Full article in A&D no. 237)
