Sunday 19 April 2020

avtomobilny

Sold domestically as the Zhiguli (ะ–ะธะณัƒะปะธ, after the mountain range bordering the Volga) and branded as the “Lada” for export (see previously, the designation being an earlier variation for the region in reference to the pirate gangs encamped in the valleys), the automotive manufacturer introduced its VAZ-2101, the initialism standing for Volga Automotive Plant. With seven models in the series, some seventeen million cars were produced until the line was discontinued in 2012—manufacturing at an Egyptian factory continuing until 2014.

Friday 17 April 2020

7x7

610 wagon: Salvador Dalรญ was once commissioned to paint an advertising campaign (see also) for Datsun Motors

dรฉnouement: the Hero’s Journey during lockdown—see also

location scout: exploring how tax regimes and local ordinances limn the imagination in film and television adaptations

coade stone: the weather proof wonder material that’s the stuff of statuary and architectural embellishments

home office: not free to go out, Banksy gives the guest bathroom a makeover

now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational battle station: NASA under Trump struggles to deliver even the solace of science with exploration becoming exploitation

the ever-changing motor car: 1965 animated short for Ford of Britain by the same collaboration behind Yellow Submarine

Tuesday 14 April 2020

autostadt

Via Things Magazine we discover that adjacent to the flagship Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg there are two museums, ZeitHaus, one dedicated to the brand’s greatest automotive hits with pavilions full of Lamborghini, ล koda, Bentleys as well as their own cars—with the other wing surely worth the visit as well, is filled with prototypes, test models and show cars that never went into production for the driving public. Exhibits include the 1990 Vario, a concept, a transitional buggy test-marketed prior to the introducing of the new Beetle. See more unrealised roadsters at the link above.

Tuesday 7 April 2020

ghost crash

Via Things Magazine, we are confronted with the creepy, unsettling footage of vehicular collisions with the second car digitally removed. It’s a very simple yet powerful effect that the creator Donato Sansone (previously) experimented with in the summer of 2018, which seems strangely resonant and informed by these days of staying home and social distancing.

Saturday 28 March 2020

in my merry oldsmobile

Not to be confused with the mass-produced Model-C from competitor Ford Motors that debuted the following year and marketed as a “doctors’ car,” the 1903 variant Model-6, curved dash runabout prototype called the Doctors’ Coupe unfortunately never went into production with only one ever made.
This incredibly steam-punk podium of a vehicle had two gears plus could be thrown in reverse. Though at this early point in history, the cars were named after company founder Ransom Eli Olds (and hence R.E.O. Speedwagon, another musical connection), a popular tune by vaudevillian Gus Edwards with an enduring chorus and refrain was a powerful marketing jingle:

Come away with me, Lucille
In my merry Oldsmobile
Down the road of life we’ll fly
Automobubbling, you and I

To the church we’ll swiftly steal
Then our wedding bells will peal
You can go as far as you like with me
In my merry Oldsmobile

Wednesday 11 March 2020

7x7

inside out & upside-down: hundreds of posters from CalArts students ranging back to 1980

r360: how the coupe and microcar informed Mazda’s design

area rug: custom parametric carpets informed by their settings that really bring the room together

the floor is lava: advice for keeping the cat off the kitchen counters plus an assortment of more humourous tweets

noodles and pandas: innovative ways to discuss the pandemic without attracting the attention of the authorities

happy mutants: Cory Doctorow’s daily curated links—via Waxy

white russians: contemporary fermented dairy drinks

Thursday 5 March 2020

7x7

goetheanum: a visit to the seat of the General Anthroposophical Society in Dornach in the canton of Solothurn

0107 – b moll: a brilliant short by filmmaker Hiroshi Kondo on cityscapes, commutes and light—via Waxy

musical instrument digital interface: every possible melody has been played in MIDI format, copyrighted and promptly released into public domain

pivot point: we are entering the era of Peak Car—see also

gratuitous diacritics: a peek inside the world of extreme heavy metal logos—via Things Magazine

autoritatto: an artist commissions a neural network to generate her a self-portrait out of thousands of selfies

it’s big, it’s heavy, it’s wood: documenting the wildlife traffic over this log bridge in Pennsylvania enters its second year

Monday 27 January 2020

๐Ÿš˜

As Boing Boing informs, the New England state of Vermont (see previously) may possibly join Queensland, Australia in allowing drivers to include a selection of emoji on their custom automobile registry plates (see also) after introducing a bill to that effect.
Counter to the trend of admitting pictograms into courtroom exhibits or the fact that a smiling face crying tears of joy might strike one as something more memorable than an alpha-numeric string in a traffic accident dispute, whatever emoji chosen would be an addition to the identifier and not considered one in isolation. What do you think? What vanity plates would you choose?

Tuesday 21 January 2020

a guide to wildflowers at speed

We appreciated this field guide that implicitly urges one to stop a smell the roses and examine, frame by frame at the glimpses into Nature that we’re afforded, even when they’re passing us by in a blur. Like other manuals, varieties are classified by the colour of their blooms and time of year they go to flower but are portrayed as a patch on a roadside verge would look zipping past. Like Birds through an Opera-Glass (one of the first in its genre, 1890 by Florence Merriam), what other subject is often seen from a skewed perspective, the Solar System galloping past warp speed ahead?

Sunday 5 January 2020

laderoboter

Though the deployment date for these units is still to be determined, Volkswagen has developed a concept for a seamless, mobile electric-vehicle charging scheme for use in parking garages and similar spaces that will automatically locate and re-fuel cars in need, carrying their banked power in battery wagons to where it’s needed.
Once ready to integrate the system in a given location, it would be relatively easy to set up without much change to existing infrastructure and electric-vehicle owners wouldn’t feel the need to compete for a limited number of charging points or fight over a reserved parking space.  Such helpful robots could even patrol metered-parking in urban centres from the sidewalks, searching for automobiles in need of topping-up.

Friday 13 December 2019

model-t

Via Kottke, we learn that in 1966 that the Ford Motor Company developed a concept pickup truck called Ranger II, whose chassis not only bears a passing resemblance to the Cybertruck (previously here and here) but also included features like an unbreakable windshield. Hopefully Tesla’s design will emerge successfully from the drawing-room and on to road-worthiness.

Tuesday 26 November 2019

racing stripes

A clever artist at a forum dedicated to the aesthetics of Vaporwave (previously) has made the Cybertruck a bit friendlier and less severe with a splash of Solo Jazz, a 1992 teal and purple design pattern created by Gina Ekiss, having since achieved cult status, for paper cups and plates.

Sunday 24 November 2019

low poly

In addition to the all-terrain mobile unit as an accessory to Elon Musk’s newly released prototype Cybertruck—which people joke looks like a computer rendering from a time when graphics processing with polygon mesh (see also) wasn’t nearly so advanced as it is presently—will have the optional package outfitting the cargo bed as a pop-up camper for exploring the actual outdoors and not CGI side-scrolling.
What do you think? Critics are bashing the design, forgetting about the experimental wedged wonders of the Italian automotive tradition that were all the rage not so long ago, but we’d seriously support getting such a car for our next vehicle—especially considering a range of nearly eight hundred kilometres to a charge and over-engineered performance that allows the truck to zip about faster than finest luxury cars, not to mention the target price that’s half of the suggested manufacturer’s asking-price.

Sunday 13 October 2019

ampelmรคnnchen

Introduced in East Berlin on this day in 1961, the “little traffic light man” was the product of extensive research and experimentation on the part of safety planner and vehicular relations psychologist Karl Peglau (*1927 – †2009), whom had wanted to make stop lights differentiated not only by colour but also by shape to provide cues to the not insignificant portion of the population who were colour-blind—seeing his vision realised in one aspect at least.
Modelled off a candid image taken of the then Politbรผro member who organised the building of the Berlin Wall, future long-term general secretary Erich Honecker, sporting a jaunty straw hat, the icons’ two poses, walking briskly and arms akimbo signalled to pedestrians when it was safe to cross. After reunification, East German street and traffic signage was dismantled in efforts to standardise typefaces and the Ampelmรคnnchen nearly succumbed to the same fate but was saved (with many tributes—here and here for example) due to the intervention of a soap opera and the symbol was made a mascot of East Germany and Ostalgie.

Monday 26 August 2019

a proper miniature car

On this day in 1959, the British Motor Corporation (BMC) launched its iconic, signature Mini, conceived by Greco-British automotive designer Sir Alec Issigonis (*1906 – †1988), commissioned to produce a domestic “proper miniature car” in response to the import of German and Italian bubble cars.
Aggressively marketed with celebrity-endorsement and some two-thousand exemplars exported to a hundred countries to coincide with the premiere of the Mark I—meant to satisfy demand for a stylish car responsive to the need for fuel economy set off by the Suez Crisis a few years earlier, the original model and later iterations acquired dozens of monikers and pet names including the Morris Mini Minor, the Wolsesey Hornet, the Riley Elf, the Innocenti Mini and the Austin Panther.

Tuesday 13 August 2019

wedged wonders

We really enjoyed reviewing this alluring photo-session from Docubyte (the moniker of James Ball) who captured the aura of the golden age of Italian avant-garde automotive design in the collections of the carrozzeria of Turin, Milan and Marese.  Many of the profile vehicles were never put into mass-production, like this angular Ferrari 512 Modulo by Paolo Martin that debuted at the 1970 World Expo in Osaka, and represent one-of-a-kind experimentation.

Wednesday 7 August 2019

ferrari veicoli speciali

Messy Nessy Chic directs our attention to the adorable off-road Ferves Ranger.  Introduced at the 1966 Salone dell‘Automobile di Torino, the four-wheeler (there was both a passenger and a cargo version) with an open chassis and Fiat motor notably had a left-hand drive and six hundred models were produced until the manufacturer ceased operations in 1970.

Saturday 15 June 2019

powertrain

Among the items and lots going under the hammer this summer, auction-watcher Messy Nessy Chic reports is this pristine 1964 Peel Trident, a British microcar and a product of Manx engineering, the estimated forty-five to fifty-five models made mostly going to the mainland.
Originally priced at £190 and with fuel efficiencies of just under three litres per one hundred kilometres and touted as nearly cheaper than walking, the smallest car in the world was perhaps a little ahead of its time and interest waned among the driving and dashing public (the car had a detachable shopping basket and was primarily meant for quick city errands). Manufacturing operations resumed in 2011 in Nottingham, creating custom electric and petrol models for individual clients. Learn more and inspect other lots and properties up for auction at the link above.

Wednesday 12 June 2019

hello light

Attempting to reform and reclaim its reputation after the misleading missteps that influenced the purchasing decisions of many drivers, going for diesel-fuelled models believing that they were far cleaner and more efficient than they were in reality, Volkswagen is acknowledging its past transgressions and lack of candour with an advertising campaign that references its older reputationmaking lemonade out of lemons.
The new series of commercials debut the long-awaited production of the microbus (see also), reborn as a fully electric vehicle. I hope that the company has learned a valuable lesson in transparency and can again lead the industry towards better transparency and accountability and that they are earnest in their new direction. What do you think? Just the other day, however, I caught the tail end of a comment from company executives reportedly pressing governments to reverse the mothballing of nuclear plants (a fraught decision in itself but also a pledge) so they’ll be sufficient energy to power its electric fleet, which was a bit discouraging to hear and might be yet another wedge that big business can hold up as an excuse not to reform or take responsibility.

Wednesday 29 May 2019

konzeptfahrzeug

Debuting at the 1970 Geneva Motor Show (Genfer Autosalon), this transalpine-influenced concept vehicle, the 2200 TI Garmisch, designed by the legendary automotive free-lancer Marcello Gandini (the Lamborghini Miura, the Countach and the Lancia Stratos as well as the original 5-series) was seemingly shelved in favour of other projects by BMW—until, that is, its recent revival with a limited-production run at a car show in Villa d’Este, Tivoli.
The minimalistic dashboard and instrumentation panel belies the cutting edge of technology, sleek aluminium frame and namesake of town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, part of the Bavaria Motor Works home state but exotic and a part of that spirit of Alpine exchange evokes adventure. See more at Design Boom at the link above.