Driving Toward A Snazzier Style

By Daren Fonda

Profits may be scarce in Detroit, but it's a bountiful time in design, judging by the new products for the 2007 model-year. Carmakers plan to launch more than 60 vehicles, starting next month, swelling auto malls with all manner of compacts, coupes, wagons, minivans, muscle cars and SUVs. For manufacturers, producing a car that stands out is getting tougher every year. And as Ford and GM are painfully aware, if your metal doesn't shine in the style department--and you can't beat your rivals on performance or reliability--all you can offer is a cut-rate deal, a path to financial ruin. What's a carmaker to do?

At Ford, the road map looks like this: assemble a squad of ace designers. Put the engineers, bean counters and marketers in the backseat. Wait for the artists to produce gorgeous metal and interiors. Then pray the company can execute.

Ford's design team is stacked with talent and has only got stronger lately. Two highly regarded Brits, Peter Horbury and Martin Smith, are in charge of design for Ford's North American and European divisions, and last year Ford lured a hot hand from Chrysler, Freeman Thomas. At Chrysler, he sketched the initial concept for the 300 sedan, one of Chrysler's biggest hits in a decade. At Ford, Thomas has already won praise for a concept car, the Reflex, featuring solar panels, butterfly doors and internal insulation made of recycled Nike shoes. "Bill [Ford] has come out and said, 'We're going to do more compelling and emotional design,' and he's sent that message internally," says J Mays, group vice president of design. "That's taken the shackles off and allows us to do product we probably wouldn't have been allowed to do five years ago." Among those bolder models: the 2006 Fusion sedan and the 2007 Edge crossover vehicle, due out later this year.

Ford designers could use an unshackling. Aside from a few critically acclaimed hits, such as the new Mustang and GT sports car, the fleet is clogged with bland wheels. Car critics pounded Mays for the 2005 launch of the Ford Five Hundred, a middle-market sedan with all the elan of Wonder Bread. Ford's revival of the legendary Thunderbird, in 2001, flopped so badly that production was suspended last year. Geriatric wonders like the Grand Marquis and Town Car still roll out of Mercury and Lincoln plants, headed mainly for corporate fleets. Only Mazda, which Ford controls, appears to be reliably cranking out critically lauded models, from the compact Mazda 3 to the MX-5 roadster. In view of the warm reception for the CX-7, a crossover vehicle unveiled at the Detroit auto show, Mazda has another hit.

Ford is rediscovering the power of car design after a long period in which boxy SUVs and pickups dominated the lineup. In the five years prior to 2003, Ford launched just one all-new car in North America, the Focus, which was designed and engineered in Europe. Now it's all about cars--even in pickup design. Ford's latest concept truck, the F-250 Super Chief, was created with the comforts of a car in mind; the rear seats were "inspired by spacious club chairs," the company says.

Across the fleet, Ford is putting more faith in designers, says Mays. Hits like the Mustang persuaded top management to give designers more authority over a model's proportions, and there appears to be less bureaucratic meddling. Thomas, who heads design studios in California and Michigan, says he can negotiate vehicle dimensions directly with his counterpart in advanced engineering, eliminating middlemen in marketing, say, who might nibble away at a strong vision. "The only thing that's going to separate our company from the rest is great design," says Mays. Investors just hope Ford can turn those sketches into sales.

With reporting by Reported by Joseph R. Szczesny / Detroit