Photo: S. Baldauf/SB-Medien
We wouldn't go as far as to call car designers artists - they are working for a commercial company, after all - but putting your signature on a new vehicle and sending it out into the world must feel a bit like opening a new exhibition.
People are going to look at your creation, judge it, and in the end, they will form an opinion on both your work and, by extension, yourself. Some are going to like it, others will not, and there might even be those who will hate it. That's not to be unexpected.
However, the real problem comes when most of the reactions fall into the latter two categories. In that case, you're left with two options: either you play the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" and "style is subjective" cards, or you accept your failure, dust yourself off and start all over again.
Gerry McGovern, the head of design at Land Rover, appears to take the first of the two approaches. Talking to British media outlet Auto Express, the discussion inevitably veered toward the rear end of the new Land Rover Discovery. The consensus seems to be that the company really messed things up there with a look that seems unfinished, not to mention incredibly narrow for such a tall vehicle.
Mr. McGovern doesn't agree, though: “Overall, I like the design of the back of the Discovery for its asymmetry,” he says. Uhm, nobody said anything about that. In fact, that's probably its only redeeming feature - the one thing keeping it from looking like a generic SUV instead of a Discovery successor.
He did identify the real problem, though, and it has nothing to do with his pen work: it's the license plates. He says most British dealerships wrongly install the taller plates instead of the slimmer ones, which is the design he had in mind during the initial creative process. “[...] we do need to do something about the number plates,” he insists, hanging on to this idea as the silver bullet to silence all critics.
But that's much better than what Mr. McGovern said earlier this year, in a talk with Motoring. Confronted with the same problem, he had a regrettable outburst saying “I’m a professional designer and they’re not.” And just in case his opinion wasn't clear, he concluded by saying “I think it hangs together really well.”
He also had the audacity of criticizing the older model, saying its design "didn't resonate with a lot of people" and that it was "polarizing." Well, we may not know the Myriam Webster definition of the word "polarizing," but we'd say the new model's design describes it pretty well. With the sole difference that there's only one man on one of the poles, and that's Mr. McGovern. What do you think? Would you keep him company, or are you with the rest who think it could have been done better?
However, the real problem comes when most of the reactions fall into the latter two categories. In that case, you're left with two options: either you play the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" and "style is subjective" cards, or you accept your failure, dust yourself off and start all over again.
Gerry McGovern, the head of design at Land Rover, appears to take the first of the two approaches. Talking to British media outlet Auto Express, the discussion inevitably veered toward the rear end of the new Land Rover Discovery. The consensus seems to be that the company really messed things up there with a look that seems unfinished, not to mention incredibly narrow for such a tall vehicle.
Mr. McGovern doesn't agree, though: “Overall, I like the design of the back of the Discovery for its asymmetry,” he says. Uhm, nobody said anything about that. In fact, that's probably its only redeeming feature - the one thing keeping it from looking like a generic SUV instead of a Discovery successor.
He did identify the real problem, though, and it has nothing to do with his pen work: it's the license plates. He says most British dealerships wrongly install the taller plates instead of the slimmer ones, which is the design he had in mind during the initial creative process. “[...] we do need to do something about the number plates,” he insists, hanging on to this idea as the silver bullet to silence all critics.
But that's much better than what Mr. McGovern said earlier this year, in a talk with Motoring. Confronted with the same problem, he had a regrettable outburst saying “I’m a professional designer and they’re not.” And just in case his opinion wasn't clear, he concluded by saying “I think it hangs together really well.”
He also had the audacity of criticizing the older model, saying its design "didn't resonate with a lot of people" and that it was "polarizing." Well, we may not know the Myriam Webster definition of the word "polarizing," but we'd say the new model's design describes it pretty well. With the sole difference that there's only one man on one of the poles, and that's Mr. McGovern. What do you think? Would you keep him company, or are you with the rest who think it could have been done better?
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