MINI Reveals What Its Next Generation Of Road-Ready Cars Will Look Like
Image via BMW Group
MINI is pacing into the future by keeping it simple while flexing its most iconic motifs.
The BMW-owned automaker has unveiled the striking design features that will set its vehicles apart from others on the road. While MINI teased the new visionary design language, called ‘Charismatic Simplicity’, in the past, the latest demonstration is much more realistic and outlines how the details will appear on actual roadcars. Specifically, these changes will come to the next generation of Cooper and Countryman vehicles.
As the brand describes, ‘Charismatic Simplicity’ is a “reduced design language” that’s minimalistic yet accentuated by “distinctive design features, while exuding individuality with a clear brand affiliation.”
Image via BMW Group
For starters, you’ll find these flashes of boldness in new seating that’s woven with threads of color on the side panels. Additionally, as Car and Driver notes, the leather material on the seats is perforated with a houndstooth pattern for a luxurious finish akin to upmarket automobiles.
The next-generation steering wheel arrives with two spokes, though an optional version allows a third cloth spoke with “a distinctive fabric finish” and “sporty geometry.”
Radical light-alloy wheels are redesigned to fit the audacious/minimalist aesthetic by “no longer [focusing] on the sculptural nature of the spoke structure, but on a graphic design characterized by strong color contrast,” MINI explains.
The company shares that the new wheel design “creates an illusion of size, which is further emphasized by the outward-pointing spokes.”
Notably, as MINI speeds into its next chapter, it has also reimagined its signature circular central instrument with a “visually reduced” 11-inch round OLED touchscreen, with touch controls for toggling infotainment and climate settings.
“With our new Charismatic Simplicity design language, we are completely rethinking the iconic MINI,” describes Oliver Heilmer, head of Mini Design. “Our purist, progressive approach combines the simplicity of functional elements with the emotionality that MINI is renowned for.”
Heilmer elaborates: “We are convinced that the conscious reduction to a few, but expressive elements enable innovations that would have been unthinkable before.”
[via Car and Driver and Autoblog, images via BMW Group]
