Christopher Edward Bangle

Christopher Edward Bangle was born in Ravenna, Ohio; raised in Wisconsin, he attended Wassau West High School (1972-1975) and the University of Wisconsin, Liberal Arts Studies (1975-1977), Art Centre College of Design in Pasadena, CA (BS with honors and Master in Industrial Design (1977-1981); during his studies he worked as assistant designer at Hartkopf Associates (1978-1981)
after the studies Bangle worked at first for Opel and Fiat becoming in January of 1992 the Director of Centro Stile Fiat - one of the main design centers in Turin; he participated in the design of Fiat Coupe and Alfa Romeo 145.
Bangle became BMW's Head of Design Development in October of 1992 and Head of the Designworks 1996-2001 - US design subsidiary purchased by BMW from American veteran designer Charles W. Pelly (Chuck) in 1996; Bangle was BMW's overall Head of Design 2007-2009; he was responsible for the designs of the  BMW E81 / E82 / E87 / E88, E90 / E91 / E92 / E93, E60 / E61, E63 / E64 , E65 / E66 and E53; Bangle himself spoke about expression of power in its design and BMW signature elements in the body of the car; his ideas were called deconstructivist in a sense that his designs moved away from the traditional function>material>form equasion; he also spoke about flame surfacing of the body of the car (talking about the first Z4 in 2002),the so called ß "Bangle butt" - an aggressive rear shape of the E65 7 series (in fact designed by van Hooydonk) has been attributed to Bangle, as he has not been afraid to move the BMW styling in this aerodynamically sensible direction;gifted speaker and a renown seller of his ideas, Bangle worked closely with Adrian van Hooydonk who succeeded him at BMW; after the departure from BMW, Chris Bangle wanted to complete the construction of his private house in Italy and had plans to establish his own design studio
Bangle said in one of his lectures: Cars are art, cars are what we are.

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Freeman Thomas

Freeman Thomas, born August 20, 1957, is an American automobile and industrial designer who has worked for Porsche, Volkswagen Group, DaimlerChrysler and Ford.
He is the son of an American military air traffic controller and a German mother, traveled frequently around Europe during his childhood. This led to an early awareness of cars - in his own words, "a certain sense of automotive space."
After graduating from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, Freeman worked as a senior designer at Porsche from 1983 to 1987.
After leaving Porsche, he worked in consultancy, journalism and teaching, before joining Volkswagen of America in 1991.
While at the Volkswagen Design Center in Simi Valley, California, he collaborated with fellow Art Center graduate J Mays on the design of the Volkswagen Concept 1 concept car, a modern re-interpretation of the original Volkswagen Beetle. This was first shown at the 1994 North American International Auto Show (NAIAS), and the positive response led to the car entering production as the Volkswagen New Beetle. In 1994, he began the design of the acclaimed Audi TT concept car, which also led to a production modeling.
From 1996 to 1999, Thomas was a member of J Mays' SHR Perceptual Management industrial design consultancy, before returning to Volkswagen of America as head of design.
In 1999, Thomas was appointed vice president of DaimlerChrysler Advanced Product Design Strategy, later beconing head of their Pacifica Advanced Design Center in 2002. At DaimlerChrysler he oversaw the design of several Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep concept cars and production models.
Thomas moved to the Ford Motor Company, taking up the role of Director, Strategic Design for North America on 1 June 2005. He is responsible for developing product design strategies and concept vehicles for the Ford (inclusive of the current Mustang design), Lincoln and Mercury marques.

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J Mays

J Mays, born October 15, 1954 in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma, U.S., is Group Vice President of Global Design and Chief Creative Officer at Ford Motor Company. His name is simply "J", named after his grandfather, S J Mays.
Born in rural Oklahoma, Mays started working at his family's auto-parts store at an early age. While attending Maysville High School in Maysville, Oklahoma, Mays enrolled in an occupational drafting program at Mid-America Technology Center in Wayne, with aspirations of architecture.[citation needed] After high school, he studied commercial art at the University of Oklahoma before briefly switching to journalism. In 1976, he transferred to the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, graduating in 1980 with a Bachelor of Science degree in transportation design.
Mays began his career as an exterior designer at AUDI AG, a subsidiary of Volkswagen Group, in Ingolstadt, Germany. While there he work on the design of the Audi 80. After a brief stint in 1983 at BMW in Munich where he worked on designs for the 5 Series and 8 Series cars, he returned to Audi the following year as senior designer, where he worked on the design of the Audi 100, Volkswagen Golf and Volkswagen Polo.
In 1991, the Mays-designed Audi Avus quattro concept car was unveiled at the Tokyo Motor Show. The Avus, named for the 1930s grand-prix racetrack in Berlin evoked the design of the German speed-record cars and gran turismo roadsters of the 1930s.The Avus proved to be significant for both Audi and Mays. The form of the Avus led to the development of Audi's TT, designed by Mays' Art Center colleague Freeman Thomas,[4] later to become head of Ford's Strategic Design in 2005.

Mays headed the Volkswagen Concept 1 project.
Mays moved back to the United States in 1989, to become chief designer at the Volkswagen of America Design Center in Simi Valley, California. While there, he collaborated with Thomas on the design of the Volkswagen Concept 1 concept car, a modern re-interpretation of the Volkswagen Beetle. This was first shown at the 1994 North American International Auto Show, and the positive response led to the car entering production as the Volkswagen New Beetle.
He returned to Germany in 1993 as Audi's design director responsible for the company's worldwide design strategy, development and execution.

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Edward T. Welburn

Edward T. Welburn is General Motors' current Vice President of Global Design. To date, he holds the highest-ranking position as an African American in the automotive industry. He has overseen the development of recent GM products, such as the 2010 Buick LaCrosse, 2010 Chevrolet Camaro, Chevrolet Malibu, Cadillac CTS, and Buick Enclave. Recent concepts overseen by Welburn include the Cadillac Converj, Cadillac CTS Coupe, Chevrolet Camaro Coupe, Chevrolet Camaro Convertible, and the Buick Invicta Concept.
He holds the same position at General Motors that Harley Earl and Bill Mitchell once held.

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Wayne Cherry

Wayne K Cherry (born 1937) is a noted American car designer is responsible for the conversion of Opel-style lines into the British Vauxhall or American counterparts for General Motors. In an age of high profile 'designer' names in the car industry, Cherry is hardly a household name, yet his designs spanning five decades easily count among the most influential in the industry.
Cherry joined GM in 1962 upon graduation from the Art Center design school, initially working at GM in the US as an Associate Creative Designer. At this time, as a young designer, he was a member of the teams that designed the original Chevrolet Camaro/Pontiac Firebird twins, and the Oldsmobile Toronado, both considered to be modern classics. He was a contemporary colleague of John De Lorean, whose idea it was to do the Pontiac GTO at this time, also considered a modern classic. In 1965, he transferred to Vauxhall Motors in the UK, GM's UK operations.
The design direction was already set for the Viva, Victor and others. However, Cherry's influence was immediate, introducing bold American styling cues to Vauxhall's passenger car range, with the 1966 Vauxhall XVR concept vehicle which was shown at Geneva.
However, it was the 1970 concept car, the Vauxhall SRV, that really got his designs noticed, creating a sleek shape that was ahead of its time, and a forerunner of the 1971 Lamborghini Countach. It was unlike anything the public would have expected from Vauxhall. Cherry became Assistant Director of Design for Vauxhall in 1971, when Bedford Trucks also fell under his aegis. Cherry went on to inject some much-needed boldness into the dowdy Viva range with the dramatically styled 1973 Vauxhall Firenza "droopsnoot", a car which took aerodynamics seriously for the first time in a mass-market British-built car, and one which would set the tone for much of GM's styling direction in Europe for the next two decades. Appointed Director of Design in 1975, Cherry's influence was extensive, with all new developments from Vauxhall featuring the aerodynamic "droopsnoot" - the Chevette, Cavalier and Carlton all receiving the Cherry treatment. While the engineering of these cars was largely carried out by Opel in Germany, the Opel versions at this time tended to feature much more conservative styling than their British counterparts. Cherry's 1978 concept design, the Vauxhall Equus, established him as a stylist equal to those at Bertone and Pininfarina, though the cross-Atlantic influence was ever-present.
In 1983, Cherry became Director of Design at the Opel Design Centre at Rüsselsheim in Germany, as part of the consolidation of operations between the two arms of the company. He reorganised the structure of GM's European styling teams, such that all models produced from then on were common Vauxhall/Opel designs. Under his directorship, cars such as the Astra, Corsa, Calibra and Tigra were designed, among many others.
Cherry returned to GM's US Chevrolet operations in 1991, though his work in Europe continued in parallel. His designs at this time included models for Chevrolet, Geo, Saturn and others. In 1992 Cherry became vice president of design for GM worldwide, the fifth head of design in GM's history. His responsibility covered all of GM's North American brands - Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Chevrolet Truck, GMC, Hummer, Pontiac and Saturn. His work in Europe clearly influenced new GM designs, which started to become much more "European" in flavour than earlier US-designed vehicles. Designs such as the Pontiac Solstice, Cadillac Sixteen and so forth were all produced under Cherry's directorship. Also the new Cadillac vision, the H2 Hummer, the Chevy SSR, as well as over 100 concept vehicles which were developed.
Cherry retired in 2004.

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Ken Okuyama

Ken Okuyama (1959-) is an automobile designer who worked for Pininfarina designing or supervising projects such as the Enzo Ferrari and Ferrari P4/5. His given name is Kiyoyuki Okuyama (奥山清行) but goes by Ken Okuyama (ケン・オクヤマ) outside Japan. He was born in Yamagata City, Japan but now lives in Italy speaking Japanese, Italian and English fluently.
Okuyama graduated from the Art Center College of Design in 1986. For the next 3 years he was a visiting professor at Tohoku University of Art and Design as well as being Chief Designer for Honda's NSX project. In 1991 he returned to teach part time at the Art Center College of Design in California. Between 2000 and 2004 he was Chair of the Transportation Design Department at the college but in 2004 he was offered a job at Pininfarina.
Ken Okuyama worked for General Motors and Porsche helping design the new generation Porsche 911 (aka 996) as well as the Boxster. Before moving to Pininfarina he worked for General Motors in the Advanced Concepts Center in California. During the first tenure at GM in the early '90s he was in charge of designing the Camaro and the C5 Corvette.
On 10 May 2004 Ken Okuyama began work as Creative Director at Pininfarina.He had been working with Pininafarina before, supervising the design of the Enzo Ferrari. As Creative Director Ken oversaw projects including the Ferrari 599, Mitsubishi Colt CZC, Maserati Birdcage 75th and Ferrari P4/5.
In 2006 Okuyama left Pininfarina and set up his own design firm, Newton Design Lab. His current work includes humanoid robots and furniture. He is also known for the design of a small robot called Nuvo.
In late 2007 , Okuyama launched the Ken Okuyama Eyes collection, an eyewear collection manufactured in Japan.
In 2008, Ken Okuyama presented his first concept car under his own name - the K.O. 7 Spider, a carbon fiber and unpainted aluminum two-seater. The K.O. 7 was unveiled at the Geneva Motor Show in March 2008. Ken Okuyama has cooperated with the luxury watch producer TAG Heuer, having fitted the TAG Heuer Grand Carrera at the dashboard of the car. The interior of the concept car was suggested by the design of the TAG Heuer watch.
In 2008, Ken Okuyama's design studio will produce the first 20 models of the K.O. 7 Spider, already pre-sold to an 'inner circle' of designer's fans. It will be followed by the production of 99 cars in 2009 and 99 more in 2010.

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Patrick Le Quément

Patrick G. M. Le Quément (born 4 February 1945 in Marseille) is a retired French car designer, formerly chief designer of Renault.

Born in France but brought up in the United Kingdom, Le Quément holds a BA Hons. degree in Product Design from Birmingham Institute of Art and Design, and an MBA from Danbury Park Management Centre.

Le Quément joined Simca of France in 1966 after graduation, but left and set up his own design business which failed.[1] He returned to England and Ford in 1968 as a designer, where his signature products included the Ford Cargo truck, and 1982's seminal Ford Sierra, ridiculed at the time for its jelly mould shape. The latter car was designed at Ford´s engineering and research centre in Merkenich, near Cologne, Germany. Promised promotion, he went to Detroit but returned to Europe in June 1985 when Carl Hahn, Chairman of the Volkswagen-Audi Group, invited him to set up a centre for Advance Design and Strategy.

In light of poor and declining sales, Renault then-chairman and CEO Raymond Levy recruited le Quement on a hunch that French design could jump-start the company. But before he took the job as Vice President, corporate design in 1987, le Quément demanded structural changes in the role of design at Renault, telling Levy: his department would no longer answer to engineering; outside consultants were removed; the design team was doubled to more than 350 people; the department took a seat on the executive board; and personally, le Quément answers to no one but the chairman.

His team's products since have included Twingo, Mégane and Mégane II – which he later admitted in an interview with Automotive News Europe magazine, was too much of a bold design; Scénic; the Espace models of 1994 and 1998; Kangoo; Laguna models of 1994; Avantime and the Vel Satis of 2002.

Le Quément's motto is Design = Quality, and says his structural changes of Renault design were to develop an independent and innovative formal language: "Up to just a few years ago, I would have given you the name of individual products – but today I would be more inclined to say Renault Design. So basically we have abandoned what I call 'styling esperanto', namely the formal language used by most other manufacturers".

In 1987 Le Quément was appointed Senior Vice President of Quality and Corporate Design in 1995, when he also joined the Renault Management Committee. He is the head of Joint Design Policy Group formed by Renault-Nissan design body, since it was founded in 1999.

In 2002 he was the winner of the Lucky Strike Designer Award, and he sits on the board of the Europa Academy for Automotive Excellence.

On 10 April 2009, he announced his retirement in October 2009. He was replaced at Renault by Laurens van den Acker, former Head of Design at Mazda.

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Laurenz Schaffer

German designer who came to BMW in 1998 from Frog Design; Schaffer studied at Ludwig Maximilian University and Fachhochschule in Munich (FHM) , degree from Industrial Design, (1987-1992), after the studies he worked as a free lance designer, at Frog Design Gmbh he worked at their San Francisco studio, he later led the BMW Designworks Munich studio (2000-2009) and was for some time in charge of the BMW Lifestyle collection (2003-2006), on December 1, 2009 Laurenz Schaffer  became the President of Designworks at California Designworks Studio, taking over from  from Verena C. Kloos who left for the Munich BMW Design studio.

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Adrian van Hooijdonk

Dutch designer born in Echt (Limburg) as Adrian van Hooijdonk, he went to school and Lyceum in Echt - a small municipality in the predominantly Catholic province of the Netherlands, squeezed between Germany and Belgium; studied at University of Technology in Delft, Netherlands (diploma 1988),  where almost 20 years earlier Harm Lagaay studied and after two years of work continued his studies at the renown, not existing anymore, Art Centre College of Design Europe, Vevey, Switzerland (1989-1990); career: first for a year a free-lance designer (1988-1989), then as a product designer with GE Plastics Europe in Bergen op Zoom (1989-1990); after the Automotive Design studies at Vevey - since 1992 with BMW in Munich as an automotive exterior designer; since 2000 with Designworks in the US as the Head of Automotive Exterior Design Dept and since 2001 as the President of the Designworks, US

responsible among others for the gull-wing Z9 Gran Turismo prototype, BMW 6 series E63/E64 and E 65 7 series

in his Z9 GT design (1999) van Hooydonk introduced the sculptured design idea, which for more than a decade influenced BMW body styling; the Z9 design brought also several future solutions of the BMW cars to come as flat almost symbolic front grille, long hood, aggressive but short rear, sculptured addition on the trunk serving as a rear wing called later Bangle butt

van Hooydonk led Designworks from Sept. of 2001 until 2004, during his time there, van Hooydonk penned a number of different designs, among others chairs designs for Emeco - American iconic aluminum chair producer,

van Hooydonk worked closely with Chris Bangle, he co-authored the radical design policy of the BMW new cars development at the beginning of the 21c., he became BMW Head of the car design 2004 and from Febr., 2009 after departure of Chris Bangle, he became Director of Design, BMW Group.

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