When an established car manufacturer sets off in a new direction, the industry pays careful attention. For the past few decades, Jaguar has steered a steady course between elegance and innovation, creating strikingly handsome cars that ticked all the right boxes for their loyal buyers. Jaguar has a stronger design heritage than most, but times are moving on. In the wrong hands heritage has become a hackneyed device, with manufacturers mining the archives for once-familiar flashes of chrome and iconic air vents. Faced with a new breed of visually literate car buyers, Jaguar’s design team has tried to push the envelope even further. Enter the C-XF, a concept saloon that represents the first outing for an all-new design language, and previews the forthcoming XF saloon.
In the words of Ian Callum, director of design, the new car not only had to ‘evoke instant desire’, but also represent the cutting edge of contemporary design without paying too much lip service to passing fads. The C-XF also has ‘to warm people up to future design language,’ says Julian Thomson, Jaguar’s Head of Advanced Design. ‘A concept car is a very, very strong statement,’ he adds, ‘and the gap between concept cars and real cars is closing fast.’
Thomson happily admits that the company’s illustrious history is ‘why designers like myself are drawn to the company.’ While Jaguar has been responsible for some of the most iconic cars of all time, this legacy has to be carefully handled. First and foremost, the C-XF is about elegance, a natural beauty achieved through the car’s perfect proportions. ‘We’re going through a funny era in car design,’ Thomson muses, ‘it used to be all about proportions, but now they don’t seem to matter. Today it’s about graphics and surfaces.’ This is not the Jaguar approach. ‘Proportion and balance are the most important part of our design,’ he stresses.
The C-XF has an aggressive, forward-looking stance, with a flowing shoulder line that terminates in a steeply raked rear screen. The detailing is exquisite, from the wrap-around front and rear lights to the Jaguar logo on the boot lid. The squared-off grille and dark metal and leather interior are also bold departures. ‘An interior like that would be incredibly expensive to build, and perhaps a little daunting to live with day to day,’ Thomson admits of the cocoon-like cabin, although the move away from traditional wood and leather is to be applauded.
Thomson believes that in our fast-moving world ‘people don’t take the time to look at things,’ lamenting the subsequent loss of subtlety in design. In contrast, the C-XF is meant to be scrutinised in detail, from every curve of its elegant bodywork, high technology and all-embracing interior. For Callum and Thomson, this concept is only the beginning. As the production XF hits the roads this autumn, they’ll still be hard at work on the all-new XJ saloon, due ‘in a few years’. And if you thought the C-XF was bold, Thomson is confident the next car will be even more of a departure. ‘We’re taking a huge leap in terms of visual design,’ he says proudly, ‘perhaps one of the biggest leaps you’ll ever see.’
