"STYLES come and go. Good design is a language, not a style." So said one of the giants of 20th century commercial design, Massimo Vignelli. Over the past nearly two decades in a strategy guided by its President and CEO Carlos Ghosn, Nissan has worked tirelessly to develop a design language that has both differentiated it from its competitors and, crucially, proved a hit with the car buying public. Products across the Nissan range display design features and details – some obvious, others more subtle – that instantly mark them out as part of the same family yet still ensure each model retains its individual character. Massimo Vignelli himself would surely have approved of Nissan's approach to design, which is rooted in a clear, consistent and coherent design philosophy. It's a philosophy and an associated design language that has garnered prestigious awards and seen the creation of a vehicle line-up that competes successfully in every automotive market across the globe, not least here in the Middle East. In essence, Nissan's design philosophy is geared towards the creation of products that have instant visual appeal, something that Nissan President and Chief Executive Officer Carlos Ghosn knows is crucial to the success of new models. "Design is the first thing our customers see," he said. "It is important for the design to make customers think; "Let me know more." When customers buy cars, their decisions are often based on both rational and emotional factors. Creative, appealing design can stir a strong emotional reaction." And who among us can look at a GT-R without an emotional reaction? However, the hard part is not stirring the emotions around halo products, it's in eliciting a similar response to their mass market counterparts. So what exactly is Nissan's design philosophy? Perhaps it's best summed up in the company's own slogan, "Innovation that excites." As Chief Creative Officer Shiro Nakamura puts it, the mission is, "To create attractive designs for the excitement of our customer's everyday life." And that's not just excitement for the lucky few piloting a GT-R or 370Z. It's excitement for every Nissan customer. To help achieve Nakamura's mission the carmaker operates four design centers on three continents employing a remarkable 800 designers drawn from many nationalities. This international approach reflects a company that places a high value not only on design itself, but on the diversity and cross-cultural collaboration that fosters good design. Further elaboration on how Nissan's design philosophy is manifested in product terms comes from Executive Design Director Mamoru Aoki. "Over the years, we have developed the "face" of the Nissan brand," he says. "But it must be stressed that this does not mean making every model the same. Our desire is to use design to instill a common essence of the Nissan brand in all our vehicles while also giving them strikingly innovative images." This is where design language comes in. The idea is not to produce vehicles that look like scaled up or scaled down versions of each other, but rather products that have their own identity while being instantly recognizable as part of the Nissan family. Not easy, but over time common themes and visual cues have coalesced into Nissan's distinctive design language. The V-Motion grille, boomerang lamp signature, kick-up waist line and the so-called ‘floating roof' are among its most obvious exterior elements while interiors feature the distinctive ‘gliding wing' shape. These elements are neatly executed in the current Maxima four door sedan. It's a car that fulfills Carlos Ghosn's brief of eliciting an emotional reaction at first sight and then drawing the potential customer in for a closer look. And there certainly is interest everywhere you look on the car, from the sculpted light clusters to the swooping hood and grille, the elegant roofline and muscular haunches accentuated by those kicked-up C pillars. A graceful and inviting interior doesn't disappoint either, fulfilling the promise made by the car's external appearance. No wonder then that car has been such a success in Middle Eastern markets. But no carmaker can afford to rest on its laurels. The world, much less the automotive world, doesn't sit still and as Nissan Executive Design Director Satoru Tai explains, nor should a car designer. "To design is to consider the future. The designer's task is to stay abreast of changes in the world, since these changes contain the keys for unlocking the future," he said. "These keys must be clearly reflected in new concepts." One such concept is the Vmotion 2.0 which was unveiled at the recent North American International Auto Show (NAIAS). The car showcases Nissan's new sedan design direction as well as its intelligent-mobility technology. The Vmotion 2.0 made an immediate impact, winning the prestigious 2017 EyesOn Design Award for Best Concept Vehicle at the show. It also received the award for Best Innovative Use of Color, Graphics and Materials. The Vmotion 2.0 is not alone in winning awards for Nissan. Also at NAIAS, the redesigned 2017 Nissan Xtrail – known as the Rogue in the USA – was selected by Cars.com as its "2017 Family Car of the Year." It is the second year in a row that the crossover, Nissan's best-selling US model, has won the award. And while it is not available in the Middle East, it's significant that the new Nissan Serena was been named Car of the Year for 2016/2017 by the Automotive Researchers' and Journalists' Conference of Japan (RJC). Additionally, RJC's Technology of the Year award went to ProPILOT, the all-new autonomous driving technology which debuted in the Serena and which will gradually be rolled out in global markets. As for the future, Nissan has stated that the automotive industry is in a state of transition from the internal combustion engine to the electric motor. Nissan Design is ahead of the curve in adapting to that change thanks to its styling work on the world's best-selling electric vehicle, the Leaf. For many of us it will be our children and grandchildren who live to see a zero emission world and fittingly Nissan encourages children to learn more about both car design and zero emission vehicles through its corporate website and an outreach program. If and when those children go on to become the car designers of the future they will do well to heed the words of another iconic figure from the world of design, Milton Glaser. "There are three responses to a piece of design—yes, no, and WOW!" he said, before adding, "Wow is the one to aim for." And that just might be another way of summing up Nissan's design philosophy.
