Icon CJ3B ‘Dog’
Back in spring we told you about Icon’s range of Toyota FJ40-inspired retro minimalist off-roaders. Now news has reached us that they are planning a new, even more stripped down, model, the CJ3B or ‘Dog’ as it is affectionately being called.
Built on a custom coil-suspension chassis and powered by GM’s Ecotec 4-cyclinder (although Icon say they are also working on a full-electric version), the Dog will be sold in kit form, allowing customers to assemble it at home using only hand-tools. We like this nod to the back-page ads from Popular Mechanics in the sixties and the recession busting do-it-yourself ethos espoused by Icon. We’re sure it will win them a loyal following for their distinctive products.
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Bugatti 16C Galibier Concept
The last year or so has seen a slew of new luxury four seater supercars appear at motor shows around the world. At Frankfurt recently, Swipelife was lucky enough to get a close-up look at a lot of the contenders in this upmarket niche. The Porsche Panamera, The Maserati Quattroporte and the new Bentley Mulsanne were all there, showing that while money can’t buy you happiness, it can buy you a big, fast car to go and find it in.
Annoyingly for us though, the car that will perhaps turn out to be the daddy of all luxury GTs was not at the show. The Bugatti 16C Galibier was shown to guests at the Molsheim celebrations of the marque’s centenary. Although officially just a concept, the Galibier is apparently, already being shown to potential customers. Shod with 22-inch wheels and sitting on a 3m wheelbase, it shares the W16 engine with the Veyron, although here, in a nod to prevailing green sensibilities, it has been reengineered to also run on ethanol. We can’t help feeling that Dom Perignon would have been more appropriate.
Some people have said that it bares a passing resemblance to the Porsche Panamera. To our eyes though, the Galibier has a much more elegant profile and, surprisingly given its size, a lighter, less lumpen feel to it. Here’s hoping that this Bug makes it into production
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2009 Frankfurt International Motor Show – Top Fives
After the out-of-step-with-the-rest-of-the-world luxury smorgasbord (or should that be cheese fondue?) that was this year’s Geneva motor show; Frankfurt showed us an automobile industry that has at least noticed the current economic downturn, even if it would rather pretend it wasn’t there. So, in between the Porsche Panameras, Lamborghini Reventons and Rolls-Royce Ghosts there were a multitude of electric and small car concepts, emerging like green shoots pushing through the crumbling blacktop. But we didn’t let that spoil our fun. Here then, are Swipelife’s pick of the show, the coolest, the craziest and the bandwagons that everybody and their dog are jumping on right now:
Continue to read to check out SwipeLife’s Top Five Picks from the Frankfurt Auto Show.
Royal Falcon Fleet 135 by Porsche Design
The world of superyachts is one in which a wide variety of designers and studios are dipping their toes, drawn not only by the big money but also the larger-than-life design statements that can be made with this scale of craft.
Porsche Design Studio is the latest to join the likes of Norman Foster and Philippe Starck on the ocean waves with this 135-foot catamaran designed for Singapore-based yacht builder, Royal Falcon Fleet. The Austrian design studio didn’t let the lack of salt water near their alpine studio dull their creativity and looked skywards for inspiration. The studio said the brief from customer Royal falcon Fleet was to create a “Spacecraft on the water” and the dramatic teardrop superstructure certainly lives up to that description, even if it lacks some of the subtlety that one might previously have associated with Porsche Design products.
The 135-foot long catamaran has a beam of 41 feet which translates into an impressive 680 square metres of floor space spread over three decks, enough for ten guests and a crew of ten. All of this is moved around at an impressive 35knots (about 40mph) by twin V16 turbodiesel engines which each produce 4,600 horsepower. The first yacht will be launched at the end of 2010 and is currently being built in Sweden.
More images of the Royal Falcon Fleet 135 after the jump.
Bell Aurens Longnose
Bored? How about taking a Series II Land Rover Defender, removing the roof, windscreen, climate control and any safety equipment, replacing them with a 27 litre, 1500hp, V12 Rolls Royce Merlin engine (as used in the Spitfire fighter plane), adjusting the length of the bonnet to cope and sloping the hind quarters of the car forward to create a ‘boat-tail’ style rear?
This, more or less, is what designer Thomas Bell and his partner, marketing consultant Holger Kalvelage, decided to do when they created the striking Bell Aurens Longnose. Equal parts Land Rover, land yacht and fighter plane, with just a dash of Laurence of Arabia thrown in, the Longnose will be made by specialist coachbuilders Lorenz & Partners near Nuremberg in Germany. Stylish (and slightly eccentric, it has to be said) details that caught our eye included the non-metallic desert sand paint job, leather bonnet straps and red leather cricket ball used as a gear knob – something that found much favour with the British contingent here at Swipelife!
With a price tag of €125,000 and production likely to be limited to double digits the Longonose will remain for most of us sadly, just a desert mirage.
View images and videos of the Bell Aurens Longnose after the jump.
Pulse: Urban Bike Concept from Teague
New from Seattle-based design studio Teague, the Pulse is a fresh look at the increasingly ubiquitous urban bike conundrum: How to attract people to the whole idea of riding a bike every day and how to add practicality (well, some practicality) to the current hipsters’ must-have accessory, the fixie bike.
Designer Dana Krieger has created an iconic graphic in the semi-circular section luminescent frame and set this off against business-like matte-black tubing for the steerer, seat and rear triangle tubing. A particularly nice touch is the way these tubes are seated within the semi-circular section of the frame. Other features include discreet bar-end indicators and caged pedals that are counterweighted so that they sit the right way up slip your feet into.
It looks clean and sophisticated and begs the question; when will one of the big players in the bike market take a chance on a product with clean detailing and simple, bold graphics to match the Pulse? Although if their engineers shake their heads at the semi-circular tube section, well, maybe we can forgive them that…
More images of the Pulse after the jump.
Playforever Toys
Since 2005 designer Julian Meagher has been quietly creating children’s toys of remarkable style and quality. Made in the UK and designed by Meagher himself in his East London studio, the roadster, aeroplane and motorbike draw their inspiration from vintage vespas, classic car headlights and old biplanes. They are intended for children of all ages but quite frankly, it would be a pity to waste the minimalist curves and chunky proportions on kids. These things would look great on the shelf alongside your Rosendahl wooden monkey or Playsam Saab model – they exhibit a level of detail and attention to fit and finish that would shame many ‘grown-up’ consumer products. For big kids and budding style gurus everywhere. They are available in Europe through Habitat, or direct from Playforever.
More after the jump.
Ready-to-Wear Revival: An Interview With Patrick Grant of E. Tautz
These days, so many clothing companies claim that their products are the ‘real thing’, ‘100% authentic’ or ‘the genuine article’ that the phrases have become practically meaningless. When the advertising – and the label – promise a world of French or Italian glamour and sophistication it can be a bit galling to discover that a suit or shirt was actually made in a large, faceless factory and not in the atelier of a master craftsman.
It is then, a refreshing change to see the relaunch earlier this year, of historic British men’s sportswear label, E. Tautz. If the name promises a world of classic style, inspired by the likes of the Duke of Windsor. Then the collections so far, have delivered; High-quality cloths from around the British Isles have been used and the pieces are cut and tailored in Savile Row at the home of Tautz parent, the bespoke tailors, Norton & Sons. Indeed, Patrick Grant, the suave head of the 187 year-old company described the ready-to-wear collection as being ‘.. as close to a bespoke product as we can make a suit without actually making it for one person’.
Continue reading after the jump.
Stelton x-92 Super Charger XL
For the last forty years Danish firm Stelton has been producing some of the purest and most elegant expressions of Scandinavian design in the form of their brushed stainless steel table and gift ware.
The new range of products for Autumn 2009 continues the calm, functionalist themes first established by Arne Jacobsen in 1967 when the firm unveiled his Cylinda-Line range of tableware, and expands the scope of the items to which it has been applied.
Amongst these, the Super Charger XL is a great example of the everyday rendered stylish, elegant and practical. The charging point is large enough to contain the bigger sorts of charger and its aluminium cover acts to conduct heat away from devices’ batteries, thus prolonging their life. The lid also falls shut naturally, thanks to the cleverly designed geometry of the x-92 leaving a ledge for devices to nestle comfortably on and all the cables out of sight. Simple, serene and sophisticated; Mr Jacobsen would surely approve. Available now at Stelton.
ATNMBL – The Autonomobile
Maaike Evers and Mike Simonian are, together, the San Francisco design consultancy Mike and Maaike and are responsible for the G1 mobile phone (the first to feature the Google Android OS) were also part of the team that created the Xbox 360.
More recently they have turned their attentions to the world of car design and have produced the ATNMBL as an investigation into how a car designed without reference to the traditions and dogma of conventional automotive styling would look and function. Crucially, they also looked into what would happen if car no longer needed to be piloted by its human occupants.
The result, projected as being a solution viable in the year 2040, owes more to the disciplines of architecture and interior design than the works of Harley Earl or Nuccio Bertone. It’s tall enough to stand in, prodigiously glazed and devoid of the sculpture of an Audi TT or even the more practical (and in automotive engineering terms, avant-garde) Mercedes A-Class.
There will probably always be dyed-in-the-wool petrolheads that are sceptical of such concepts but there will probably also be plenty of people who would welcome the chance to use the time spent in traffic on their daily commute working, catching up on emails or even having breakfast instead of just staring at the rear bumper of the car ahead of them. In fact, there are probably plenty of petrolheads who would welcome the chance to hone their skills around a virtual Nürburgring with the latest edition of Gran Turismo whilst sitting in a traffic jam. Now that would be a commute.
See more after the jump.
