Lest you forget, Toyota’s origins lie in industrial weaving and textile manufacture. The company was built around Sakichi Toyoda’s automatic loom, invented in 1924, and it wasn’t until 1933 that the Toyoda Automatic Loom Works set up an automobile division. Toyota is now the largest auto maker in the world, a position it has held since 2008, innovating in both automotive and production technology.

In recent years, despite its early dominance of the hybrid car market (Toyota had sold over 15 million hybrids by the turn of this decade), the company has been a little lacklustre when it comes to committing to EVs.

Nevertheless, it hasn’t stopped turning out conceptual mobility visions, with urban areas a special consideration. From the tiny Toyota Land Hopper revealed at the 2023 Japan Mobility Show to the playful Kids Mobi concept shown two years later, Toyota seems committed to re-shaping the world of personal transport.

So where better to explore the interaction between next-generation mobility and people than in your own test laboratory? Woven City is a purpose-designed community in Japan’s Shizuoka prefecture, located close to Mount Fuji.

Described by the company as ‘a real-world test course for mobility innovation’, the ultimate aim is for this modest complex to serve as a place where Toyota’s experiments in mobility, autonomy, robotics and AI can be tried out in a full scale ‘live’ environment.

Comprising of clusters of offices and apartments on a triangular plot, Woven City is now in its initial phase. The idea for the complex stems from Toyota’s planned transition from a conventional car maker into an all-encompassing mobility company, a move it announced back in 2018.

The Woven City complex was unveiled at CES Las Vegas in 2020. The site was once home to the Toyota Motor East Japan Higashi-Fuji plant, once home to production of the first Toyota Century, the company’s enduring flagship (soon to become a more standalone entity). Today, it is overseen by a dedicated sub-company, Woven by Toyota.

Residents will be known as Weavers, while workers from Toyota and partner companies, startups and entrepreneurs will live and work alongside each other, part of a process known as kakezan, or multiplication, here meaning ‘the successful collaboration of diverse industries and individuals.’

Phase one began last Autumn, with 50 households currently occupied out of a total of around 300. Next up is the Inventor Garage, a hub/incubator space that Toyota hopes will be a cradle for next generation products, services and collaborations.

Right now, you can ride on the e-Palette autonomous micro bus,or see the diminutive Guide Mobi shifting goods. This ‘medium-sized, mid-speed autonomous transport robot’ is the modern equivalent of a mule, with the idea that autonomous systems will eventually co-exist with conventional road traffic and pedestrians.

Of course, the name Woven City is also closely linked to Toyota’s heritage - the company maintains working looms in the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology.

As the population of Woven City increases, Toyota hopes to catalyse innovation across four key areas - People, Goods, Information and Energy – with formal and informal partnerships taking technology into new and innovative directions.

Ultimately, Woven City will be the contemporary equivalent of a massive loom, knitting together various strands of today’s technological innovations into a cohesive whole.

Woven.Toyota

The word ‘touring’ has gone through many evolutions during its storied career in the motoring world. In the early 18th century, at the dawn of the automotive era, the etymology was an open-bodied car designed for long-distance travel, typically with a fold-down soft top, at least four seats and room for luggage. They were practical and built for road trips before enclosed saloons became the norm.

In the 1930s, ‘touring’ started to get a high opinion of itself and became ‘grand touring’. It was no longer just concerned with practicality; it was about being seen in comfort and luxury. The concept merged seamlessly with the tradition of European aristocracy finishing their schooling with a grand tour across the continent.

The ‘touring’ designation subsequently set aside its heirs and graces for a grittier persona in order to compete in motorsport. As modified production saloons and sometimes hatchbacks, ‘touring’ was redefined to be synonymous with one of the most hardcore and aggressive racing classes to date.

As time went on, ‘touring’ decided to settle down, get married and have 2.5 kids. Now, life was about going on family holidays to the south of France and coping with the demands of adulthood in a well-appointed living room on wheels.

With such a distinguished legacy, it stands to reason that testing a new ‘touring’ car – as per its contemporary definition – would be wasted on the North Circular. To truly understand whether the new Toyota bZ4X Touring lives up to its lineage, it needs to be thrown in the deep end where the scenery, food and language no longer resemble home. Thus we find ourselves on the banks of Lake Bled in Slovenia.

Tucked away in the Julian Alps is the most desktop-screensaver-friendly body of water you’ve ever seen. Comparable to Lake Como, without the disgraced American news anchors and Russian oligarchs. In the summer, Lake Bled is a bolthole for those escaping the sweltering hustle and bustle of the Slovenian capital, Ljubljana, and in winter it’s the gateway to the country’s alpine skiing.

Up in the mountains, down by the lakes and even in the centre of the city, there’s a welcome hush across Slovenia, a country half the area of Switzerland with a population a quarter the size. All you’ll find in the Carniolan hinterland is Balkan bird song and the faint smell of homemade schnapps on the breeze. Adding ‘whoop-tsssh’ turbo dump-valve noises into these tranquil surroundings would be uncouth.

Thankfully, the bZ4X Touring is a more practical, boxy version of Toyota's first fully electric SUV, now with almost double the boot space – enough room for 669 bottles of Slavic moonshine. Beyond mere looks, the bZ4X Touring is built for all-terrain, all-purpose family life, whether that’s picking up the kids from school with the dog and the weekly shop in tow, or a 3,000-mile summer-holiday continental road trip.

Our route through the Slovenian highlands is littered with dramatic hairpins, a dense tree line, and loose gravel roads teetering on the edge of near-vertical drops that make you nervous to look down – the perfect proving ground.

Toyota keeps it simple with the new bZ4X Touring; you can either opt for Design trim, which comes with a front-wheel-drive set-up, or the all-wheel-drive Excel trim. Although power between the two looks vastly different on paper, 221bhp compared to 376bhp, the instant torque and acceleration from the electric powertrain minimise the disparity you’d feel if those figures came from an engine.

Unsurprisingly, the front-wheel-drive version, at speed, isn’t as composed, throw it around tight bends and the rear tyres let out excited little squeals. There’s an endearing fallibility to it that shows the kind of playful character we all too often bemoan electric vehicles lack. Switch over to the all-wheel-drive model, though, and it won’t be unsettled.

Its confidence is palpable as we venture onto gravel roads – the kind of chunky gravel that would twist an elderly rambler's ankle walking home from the pub. Some cars can get so confused by loose surfaces that it’s a pain to get them to understand what’s happening. You end up sitting there scrolling through endless drive modes pleading with it to stop flicking up stones like a hooligan.

The b4ZX Touring needs none of that, its grip control system immediately comprehends the terrain and sends you flying up a 10% incline with no uncertainty. Toyota would deny it, but it feels like the company has leant on its rally car expertise and built a family car-sized rallying machine. Another feather in the ‘touring’ cap.

A subtle nod to Toyota’s motorsport background are the flappy paddles behind the steering wheel. Obviously, they don’t control any gears but instead allow you to toggle between four levels of regen in a tactile downshifting motion. It brings back the driving participation that EVs so often lose with one pedal driving, lane assist this and brake assist that.

One of the most remarkable things about the bZ4X is that it doesn’t feel like a heavy car because the secret is, it’s not. With a kerb weight of just two tonnes, it leaves plenty of room for luggage in the boot, up to 80kg of gear on the roof, passengers in the back and a trailer hauling 1500kg with the all-wheel drive model. We’ve entered an era of chronic bloat on all tech fronts, including electric cars, so it’s refreshing to drive something with a little Ozempic fuel injection.

Naturally, the all-wheel drive model takes a hit on range with an official estimate of 297 miles. Design can deliver up to 366 miles on a fully charged battery and both versions come with a slightly larger battery than the standard bZ4X. The key differences emerge in the interior specification, where Excel adds heated rear seats, ventilated front seats, panoramic sunroof and a digital rearview mirror which doubles as a normal mirror.

So, does it live up to its ‘touring’ forebears? The bZ4X Touring doesn’t conform to any traditional ‘touring’ concept but it’s all the better for it as it borrows the best bits from each iteration of its namesake. Regardless of its place in the complex web of automotive model naming, it’s most assuredly a reliable workhorse that will take in football practice, ballet lessons, and family trips to Slovenia and back with no complaints and a smile on its face.

Toyota bZ4X Touring, Design from £45,995, Excel from £51,695, Toyota.co.uk, @ToyotaUK

This is the ‘next generation new mobility’ e-Palette, Toyota’s take on the urban microbus for all applications. The compact EV will make its operational debut around Tokyo’s brand new basketball venue, the Toyota Arena, as well as at Toyota Woven City, the ongoing live experimental community that serves as a testbed location for autonomous vehicles.

The first e-Palette was revealed at the 2019 Tokyo Motor Show, part of a nationwide push towards more compact, multifunctional urban vehicles featuring high degrees of autonomous operation.

Now available for public sale for the first time, the new generation model increases interior space, with larger windows and the ability to lower its suspension and extend an inbuilt ramp to improve accessibility.

The large, open-plan interior is designed to accommodate a wider variety of uses, not just transportation, including cargo, mobile stores and food and drink concessions. At just under 5m in length, or around the size of a typical large SUV, it has a capacity of up to 17 people.

Right now, the e-palette is capable of Level 2 autonomy, the same kinds of Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) found in most modern passenger cars. The plan is to upgrade it to Level 4, where completely autonomous operation is possible with a prescribed area, by 2027.

One vision suggested by the company is a vehicle that acts as commuter transport during the morning and evening rush hours, while serving as a kiosk during the day while it is being recharged. Two large sliding doors open up the interior, with integral signage to indicate destinations and usage.

Toyota is already using the vehicle on its own sites, including Motor Kyushu’s Miyata Plant in Fukuoka, a Lexus factory. Finally, the vehicle is designed to serve as a mobile power bank when needed, especially in disaster situations.

Toyota e-Palette, from 29,000,000 yen, Toyota.jp

‘Micromobility needs to address the challenges of changing cities,’ says Stijn Peeters. The head of New Mobility at Toyota Motor Europe believes that as urban areas grapple with mounting environmental pressures and ageing infrastructure, new modes of transportation must be compact, sustainable, and affordable.

‘We believe mobility is about creating universal, inclusive, and accessible solutions that offer the greatest number of options to the greatest number of people,’ Peeters continues. This vision is embodied in Toyota’s latest concept vehicle, the FT-Me, which aims to rethink transport to meet contemporary needs.

Toyota FT-Me is a compact, versatile all-electric concept car that offers a more affordable and sustainable form of mobility for modern city dwellers. This spacious two-seater vehicle measures less than 2.5m in length. Its design emphasises manoeuvrability, as it occupies only half a parking space, making it easy to park in densely populated cities. ‘The concept plays a key role in exploring how Toyota can contribute to the evolving landscape of urban mobility,’ Peeters says.

Inspired by a pilot’s helmet, the two-tone design combines contrasting black and white to convey a sense of robustness. Boasting near 360-degree visibility, the generous greenhouse also enhances road safety by maximising eye contact with drivers and pedestrians. The removable passenger seats provide flexible cargo space, making the vehicle ideal for everyone from teenagers to delivery service workers.

‘Our goal is to develop the best mobility solutions tailored to diverse customer needs,’ states Peeters. This adaptability acknowledges that effective micromobility must serve multiple demographics simultaneously rather than targeting single groups. ‘People's mobility needs are increasingly diverse depending on where they live, whether in dense urban centres, suburban neighbourhoods, or more remote areas,’ he notes.

One of the FT-Me’s differentiators from other micromobility vehicles is its commitment to environmental responsibility. ‘The car incorporates recycled materials and targets an impressive 90 per cent reduction in carbon footprint compared to today's typical city vehicles,’ says Peeters. Featuring a solar roof that can add up to 30km of range per day, as well as an energy-efficient propulsion system that consumes three times less energy per kilometre than conventional EVs, the FT-ME makes the smallest possible environmental impact.

‘The FT-Me concept is a result of a long study considering customer needs,’ says Peeters. From the i-Road and C+pod to the Tokyo 2021 and Paris 2024 Olympic mobility solutions, Toyota has long explored micromobility. According to Peeters, the success of vehicles developed for the Olympic Games helped Toyota come up with the FT-Me concept. ‘Building on deep knowledge of new mobility gained from Paris 2024, we were ready to take the next step by creating accessible micromobility addressing the evolving needs of city dwellers and modern urban challenges,’ he says.

The FT-Me concept distinguishes itself in the micromobility market by offering a new kind of mobility that is more affordable, sustainable, and adaptable. By blending cost-effectiveness, environmental responsibility, and practical functionality, the FT-Me responds directly to the demands of evolving urban environments.

As cities continue to shrink, diversify, and intensify, concept vehicles like Toyota’s FT-Me present a nimble, connected, and eco-conscious vision for reimagining urban mobility.

Toyota.co.uk, @ToyotaUK

The fifth-generation Prius, unveiled in 2022 and released in 2023, has finally made it over to the UK. Both in form and engineering it marks a significant departure from the ultra-familiar Uber favourite of the model’s earlier dimensions.

Toyota has been building the Prius since 1997, shifting the car’s profile from pioneering piece of hybrid technology to ubiquitous urban mobility machine in the process. In that time, in excess of seven million have been sold, allowing Toyota to refine and evolve the hybrid powertrain’s efficiency and durability.

You might think it perverse to praise one of the most prosaic and quotidian cars on the road, but in truth we’ve been big fans of both the third and fourth generation Priuses (Prii?). They hide their complexity well, providing spacious, unfussy and dependable transportation, with the added bonus of being hugely efficient. The idiosyncratic styling was quite divisive, both inside and out, however.

When Toyota revealed the wedge-shaped fifth generation, the positive reception afforded the design was tempered by the fear that the company might have tampered with the winning mechanical formula. Fear not, for although this new Prius is now a genuinely attractive car, with nary a quirk in sight, it’s retained all the qualities that made its forebears so successful. Plus there are some added bonuses.

In an appropriate shade of New York taxi yellow, our test car really stood out. It remains a modest car, very slightly shorter and wider than its predecessor but clearly much lower. The Prius really is genuinely attractive, one of the best iterations of a five-door hatchback on the market, from any manufacturer. The ‘one box’ form of generations two, three and four have been usurped by a much more coherent design, with a low nose, swooping profile and neatly chopped tail.

The most dramatic exterior feature is the steeply raked windscreen. At 21.6 degrees, this is more angled than many supercars, with the trade-off of massively thick A-pillars to support it. They don’t doesn’t impinge upon forward visibility as much as you’d expect and the rest of the cabin is much more light and airy than sister models like the CH-R.

Toyota’s designers have also reined in some of the ambitious surfacing that adorned the last generation car, and the overall effect is muscular and trim, with a far more sporting stance than before. The lower roofline and larger wheels certainly help, but details like the neatly curved head and taillights also contribute to the clean profile. The new Prius feels as if it was inspired by the conceptual high design era of the 1980s and 1990s, a pre-SUV era of streamlining and high-tech interiors.

The latter also marks a step change for the new Prius. Whereas older models had a very centrally biased dashboard with a distant information panel just beneath the windscreen, Prius gen five is more driver-focused. You sit behind a small-diameter, low-set steering wheel, similar to what you’d find in a contemporary Peugeot, with a high-level driver display supplementing the main info screen. Beneath this you'll find a scattering of handy buttons for all HVAC functions, with drive functions located behind the notchy little gear selector.

As before, the Prius is a plug-in hybrid, with no EV version available. That matters not a jot because not only do you get an easy 40 miles or more of EV-only use, but the synchronicity between the modest 2.0 litre engine and the 13.6 kWh battery is seamless and economy outstanding. One minor quibble is that the engine sound a little harsh, especially when it intrudes on a previously all-electric stint of driving. However, benefits like the charge function that diverts engine power into the battery to top it up trump this very minor annoyance.

Someone at Toyota has also seen fit to up the Prius’ power output. Add the 148hp of ICE to the electric motor and the car creates the equivalent of 223hp, over 100hp more than the car it replaced. This is noticeable everywhere, from around town, to the motorway and on country roads, with much more acceleration available and a relaxed high-speed cruise. The skinny tyres of the third- and fourth-gen cars didn't exactly make for predictable, secure cornering, hence perhaps the lack of power. In the new car, the inclusion of a Sport mode actually makes sense for the first time.

These cars are as tough as old boots despite their complexity. You can regularly find examples being offloaded by Uber drivers with 2, 3 or 400,000 miles on the clock, in perfect running order. The new Prius is well equipped, fun to drive, but erring on the expensive side. However, rest assured that you’re no longer paying for novelty, but for nearly three decades of investment in technology. The Prius is the polar opposite of ‘buy cheap, buy twice’. With such starship-like mileages so attainable, it could be the only four-wheeled investment you ever need to make.

Prius, Design model from £37,315, Excel model from £39,995, Toyota.co.uk

Toyota bills its C-HR as a ‘concept car for the road’, and it’s true that this high-riding two-tone confection does have more than a whiff of futuristic whimsy about it. As a plug-in hybrid, this mid-sized, mid-range machine rides the contemporary wave of love for PHEV technology, offering practicality, efficiency and reliability.

Toyota is oft-criticised for its tardiness in getting around to engaging with all-things pure electric. The company's success and expertise in the realm of hybrids is usual cited as the reason for this heel-dragging (the pioneering Prius range has sold over six million examples), as is its dogged pursuit of a hydrogen-powered future (witness the Mirai, practically the only hydrogen-powered car on the market).

Maybe the company has a point. All things hybrid are hot right now, as legislators dilly-dally around questions of tariffs and grants, infuriating those manufacturers who made early commitments to electrification, and thoroughly confusing the market. Even so, Toyota has still hedged its bets with the C-HR, offering in both a mild hybrid 1.8-litre version and a plug-in hybrid 2.0-litre. There are a number of different trim levels, all the way up to the flagship GR Sport model, which gets a JBL sound system and other benefits inside and out.

This is a very Europe-centric car, sized in a modest way that doesn’t feel overbearing whilst still offering a raised-up driving position that seems to instil confidence in the urban and suburban driver. Whereas the original C-HR offered an incredibly dark and confined experience for rear passengers, the new model feels lighter, helped out by the optional panoramic roof.

Behind the wheel, the C-HR is an easy, unthreatening drive. It’s not especially sprung, nor is it taut and responsive, but boosty acceleration (62mph comes up in a handy 7.4 seconds) and regenerative braking make it easy to live with. There’s 41 miles of pure EV range for the plug-in model, and Toyota have introduced ‘Predictive Efficient Drive’, which uses geo-fencing to switch to EV mode in flagged congestion zones, as well as using any pre-programmed trip data to balance the battery use to ensure there’s enough spare for zero emission driving towards the end of a route. It also has a manually operated ‘charging’ mode, to keep the battery topped up.

Whatever you think of Toyota’s overall aesthetic, the detail design is top notch, from the flush door handles to the two-tone rear haunches. The hatchback body offers masses of internal space with the seats down and there’s a useful scattering of charge points and internal storage around the cabin. There is more recycled plastic used than ever before, as well as synthetic leather and a more energy-efficient painting process. When you make as many cars as Toyota, such innovations really add up – the previous generation C-HR sold around 840,000 units in Europe.

That cabin gets enhancements like Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, ambient LED lighting that changes in tone throughout the day, and a large 12.3-inch screen with plenty of customisation options. The lighting system even taps into the car’s ‘Safe Exist Assist’, glowing red if you try and open a door into the path of a cyclist or oncoming traffic. Toyota has also gone down the route of providing physical buttons for heating and cooling.

The C-HR continues Toyota’s quiet quest to transform the car into an appliance like any other, doling out just the right amount of amenity, character and quality to transform this clever car from a purely rational choice into something approaching an emotive one. If you’re blind to the intricacies of automotive brand hierarchies and histories and just want a straightforward machine that’ll deliver you from A to B without fuss or complexity for decades, then the C-HR is pretty peerless.

Toyota C-HR, from £31,300, Toyota.co.uk

All eyes are on the Toyota bz4X – the marque’s first all-new electric vehicle (there is no hybrid or ICE alternative) – to see how this most innovative of brands has tackled the issues around electrification. The short answer is that it hasn’t really done anything different to its rivals. Unlike with hybrid powertrains, a category Toyota created and ruled for decades, it’s late to the EV game. The Japanese manufacturer’s vast portfolio is subtly chopped and changed depending on local market conditions (much like McDonald’s), and although it seems a bit lumbering at times, once it’s got the basics right it swiftly moves to create a category killer.

That’s not to say the bz4X is bad or even sub-standard. By any metric, it’s as good a mid-sized electric SUV as you can get these days – a sector that’s oversubscribed and aesthetically unambitious. Under the skin it’s closely related to the Subaru Solterra and Lexus RZ – the economies of scale must work hard to keep EV costs down. 

Toyota bz4X electric SUV: a solid first step

The Toyota also shares the Subaru’s chunky plastic wheelarches, a visual element that’s also common with the two smaller Toyota models it has the most affinity with, the new C-HR and the Aygo X (a hybrid and combustion-powered car respectively). This trio represents a perfect expression of the modern small to medium-sized SUV, practical family cars with no airs and graces, good levels of kit and durable, dependable engineering. 

As the largest of the three, the bz4X also has the best claim to off-roading ability. It’s available with two- or four-wheel drive, but the latter sacrifices a bit of range (up to 318 miles versus 286 miles). As ranges go, it’s decent but not outstanding, and you’ll spend most time in ‘Eco’ mode, trying to eke out the maximum. The electric platform is Toyota’s new eTNGA modular architecture, which we’ll see crop up more and more as moves to full electrification gather pace.

The other thing that sets the bz4X apart is its long anteater-like nose, sculpted sides and animalistic rear haunches. Whilst it’s never been renowned for the visual elegance of its vehicles, Toyota is often capable of being wilfully different, and this is one of those times. Inside, the bz4X is very similar to the Solterra, right down to the driver’s instrument binnacle and the steering wheel, whilst the Lexus is a little bit more premium (and can be had with a yoke, not a wheel). 

It's also a very easy car to live with, practically sized, ergonomically unthreatening and very well put together. Toyota’s quality control is still legendary, and it has pitched itself headfirst into the debate about EV longevity by offering a guarantee that the battery will hold at least 70 per cent of its capacity after ten years or a million kilometres.

The Toyota bz4X is effectively a blank slate in terms of image. If you want a Toyota with character, go for something like a Land Cruiser, a new version of which was previewed at the 2023 Japan Mobility Show. On the other hand, many people are more than happy to trade self-conscious quirks for no-nonsense reliability. 

Perhaps what Toyota really needs to make is the EV equivalent of the Prius, a model that has sold over six million examples across five generations. Toyota has set 2035 as its target year for a 100 per cent Zero Emission fleet. We think the bz4X is a solid first step on a long journey.

Toyota bz4X, from £42,860, Toyota.co.uk, @ToyotaUK

Californian custom truck maker ICON is celebrating an important milestone, the 500th bespoke vehicle to come off its production lines. Over the years, we’ve followed founder Jonathan Ward’s journey as he turned a niche restoration garage into a cult business, beloved by Hollywood types and auto enthusiasts alike. Ward set up ICON with his wife Jamie in Los Angeles in 2003, a development of his earlier business, TLC 4x4.

ICON is a pioneer of restomod culture, the art of taking an existing classic car and upgrading and enhancing it for modern tastes without losing sight of the original design. This 500th Toyota Land Cruiser FJ44 is a celebration of the very model that inspired the creation of TLC 4x4 over 30 years ago.

The Wards had been travelling in Africa and got to appreciate the iconic Toyota design. ‘I came back from safari with my eyes completely opened to the incredible capabilities of these old, vintage Land Cruisers after seeing what they could do in the wild in harsh terrain,’ he recalls. ‘Experiencing firsthand what a Land Cruiser could do out there in that very serious, highly varied environment made a huge impression and encouraged me to start TLC 4x4, the restoration business that predated ICON.’

The first Land Cruisers were designed in the 1950s, and Ward has come to specialise in the second series, the J40s, built from 1960 all the way through to 1984 (and even surviving until 2001 in Brazil). Japan’s answer to the American Jeep, the Land Cruiser was rigorously over-engineered, capable of tackling any terrain and coming in a variety of body styles, from pick-up truck to short- and long-wheelbase variants.

This model, the 1964 ICON New School Edition FJ44, bears all the hallmarks of a typical ICON project, as well as the attention to detail that made the company’s name. Over the course of hundreds of ground-up rebuilds and repairs, Ward and his team know the model inside out, as well as the more esoteric and rare variants like the limited edition 1977 FJ40.

The restomod business evolved out of an early TLC 4x4 project to rebuild a 1965 FJ43. The client didn’t just want the nuts and bolts to be all-original – they wanted to up the quality and performance levels to achieve something no Land Cruiser had ever been before. ‘It sounds rather simplistic now, but at the time, I can assure you it was pretty radical as a concept, says Ward. 

‘This restored FJ43 showcased the nascent stages of ICON with this super premium charcoal grey metallic exterior colourway from Audi and these high-end German leather seats integrated into the build. Now, today’s enthusiasts will think, “no big deal”, but absolutely no one at the time in 2002 was integrating German luxury into a Land Cruiser.’

As Ward notes, the concept of transforming utility vehicles into luxury ones is relatively commonplace these days, whether it’s electrified Range Rovers, upgraded Land-Rovers or reinvented 1970s Jeeps. Twenty years ago, the market was wide open. ‘It started us down this very cool pathway of reimagining these beloved, but at this point, purely utilitarian Land Cruisers.’

This early work also led to a collaboration with Toyota itself, part of the Japanese giant’s project to reinvent the Land Cruiser aesthetic with its retro-styled FJ Cruiser model. ICON was born out of the experience. Central to its process is upgrading and uprating the Land Cruiser experience, avoiding what Ward describes as the ‘martyrdom of driving a vintage car’. Better brakes, chassis and suspension could all be accommodated by the immensely flexible Land Cruiser platform, which still serves as an easily accessible kit of parts to swap in and out.

ICON’s 500th Land Cruiser: New School Edition 1964 FJ44

At the heart of this New School Edition 1964 FJ44 is a 6.2L V8 engine, a manual gearbox and sports brakes and suspension. The four-seat interior has been re-trimmed, with two jump seats added at the rear, and there’s also a roof rack and ladder, with side-fitted power steps to ease access up to the cab. As well as the mechanicals, the electronics is all-new, and includes a new hi-fi, rear camera, and LED headlights. Every facet of the build can be customised, and regular repeat business shows that ICON’s customers are a loyal bunch who value the mix of idiosyncratic Japanese functionalism with modern-day cruising capabilities.

ICON hasn’t just confined itself to Land Cruisers. The company’s portfolio extends to reworkings of the classic Ford Bronco (the BR series), the Chevrolet 3100 pickup from the 1950s (TR series) the ongoing collection of unique ‘Derelicts’, quirkier one-off projects that blend hot-rod aesthetics with heavy patination, and ‘Reformers’, which do a similar job without the built-in aged aesthetic. Jeeps, Land-Rovers, even Rolls-Royces, have all had the ICON treatment. The company is always open to new challenges. 

ICON4x4.com, @ICON4x4

Luxury MPVs are a new(ish) sector in Europe, even though the idea of a monobox multi-purpose vehicle can trace its origins to cars like the 1984 Renault Espace (which had its origins in Fergus Pollock’s work for Matra in the late 1970s) and even Mario Bellini’s 1972 Kar-a-Sutra concept. 

While Bellini’s counter-cultural vision suggested we switch to sprawling, well-upholstered living rooms on wheels, the MPV really came into its own as a family car. People movers and minivans ensured a journey was a shared experience, for good and for bad, all wrapped up in a form factor that allowed multiple offspring, luggage, pets and broken biscuits to inhabit the same space. 

MPVs gave way to SUVs, with their added layer of apparent impregnability luring families away from the far more practical body type. Although monobox car designs were left to minicab owners, it didn’t stop the development of a micro-niche, the luxury MPV. Mercedes continues to offer its V-Class in a range of different guises, while Volvo is soon to launch the China-only EM90. 

In fact, Asia is where minivans still rule the streets. As well as countless mass-market models for the Japanese, Chinese and Korean markets, you’ll also find luxury-spec models, including the Hongqi HQ9, the Zeekr 009 (the Volvo’s sister car), the Denza D9, the remarkably named Trumpchi M8 and the Buick GL8 Century. All the latter are very much China-only and reflect a cultural focus on the importance of the passenger, rather than the driver. 

Lexus is therefore making a bold statement by bringing the LM to Europe. Based on the hugely successful Toyota Alphard, the LM takes inspiration from classic limousines of old, as well as last decade’s official Alphard ‘Royal Lounge’ model. Tall, broad, slab-sided and not exactly handsome, the LM is certainly an imposing vehicle. A conventional two-seater cab is placed close to the front axle, with a rakish windscreen set far from the driver, below which is a baleen-esque example Lexus’s already bountiful front grille: ‘Darth Vader’ was one of the kindlier comparisons. The front seats offer excellent visibility, a superb navigation system, as well remote door operation for the rear and certainly won’t leave your chauffeur in any discomfort.

Whether the styling ticks your boxes or not is irrelevant, for all the action is in the back seat, accessed via twin sliding electric doors. All LMs come with just four seats, with space in the rear for two independent fully-reclining, first-class airliner-style chairs. 

Lexus LM is all about the back-seat experience

In this top-of-the-range LM LM350H Takumi model you also get an electrically operated, dimmable glass partition between front and rear, as well as full massage functions on the electric rear seats, a fridge, plus a 23-speaker stereo and 48-inch rear entertainment display. Armrests contain folding tray tables, each seat gets its own touchscreen controller, and there are enough blinds and lighting options to keep you busy for hours.

For the businessperson on the move, the LM is without direct equal. Throw in the company’s ruthless quality control, reliability and all-round efficiency (helped here by a hybrid 2.5-litre petrol engine and four-wheel-drive), and you have an unrivalled mobile office (and/or mobile relaxation pod). The downsides? It’s a lot of space to give over to two seats, regardless of how special they are. And can a minivan really hold its own alongside the LM’s equivalents?

Here's where the power of branding comes in. A long wheelbase Range Rover SV with the optional SV Signature Suite two-seat rear configuration is £207,260, around about the same price as a Bentley Flying Spur hybrid. The Mercedes S580 will seat an extra passenger and costs from £123,105. If the big screen is the big draw, your only other option is BMW’s all-electric i7, with its 31-inch Theatre Screen (£127,495).

In its most fully-laden specification, the Lexus is cheaper than all of them. It’s also decidedly different, even though it lacks the various USPs of these rivals (off-road ability, craftsmanship, heritage, performance, driving dynamics, elegance, etc, etc). As a cossetting corporate carapace, the LM’s form factor makes total sense, but it doesn’t speak to the emotions like the others, for better and for worse. However, if you tone down the styling a touch, perhaps the LM represents the true future of stealth wealth mobility. 

Lexus LM LM350H TAKUMI, from £112,955, Lexus.co.uk

Jonathan Ward’s ICON began as a cult backstreet workshop re-making iconic 1970s 4x4s for an appreciative audience of fashionable LA types. Models like the ICON Dog, FJ and BR took the Jeep, Toyota Land Cruiser and Ford Bronco and gave them elaborate overhauls, customising every conceivable detail. While the company’s Derelict line restores and patinates even more unlikely classics, from 1950s Americana to vintage Rolls-Royces, even electrifying models like a classic Fiat Giardiniera, there’s also the Reformer Series. 

1970 Reformer by ICON

This is the ‘1970 Reformer’, the latest in a line of one-off projects that starts with a ‘timeless classic vehicle from any maker, from almost any era’, which is ‘then re-imagined for modern use’. The starting point was a 1970 Chevrolet Suburban, the sixth generation of a pioneering truck-based wagon that many cite as the original SUV. 

ICON’s take on this classic family wagon is typically avant-garde. For a start, the 1970 Reformer sits low to the ground, the classic contemporary custom ‘stance’. Under the meticulously smoothed and restored bonnet sits a 1,000   horsepower Twin-Turbo Alien LS 427 developed by Californian specialists Nelson Racing Engines. The chassis is also entirely new, as is the drivetrain, gearbox, suspension and braking systems. All this high-performance extremity sits within a loving restored 1970 Suburban body, with an additional rear door added for easier passenger access. 

Ward cites the influence of none other than Mies van der Rohe as one of the key inspirations behind the 1970 Reformer’s starkly minimal appearance. ‘This build was an incredible experience because the client kept wanting us to push further and further from the traditional, which I really enjoy,’ he says, pointing out that the car’s exteriors and interiors are directly taken from the legendary architect’s buildings and furniture.

Although the ‘less is more’ mantra can hardly apply to the 1970 Reformer’s performance, you can sense some of Mies’s famed meticulousness – like the one-piece grille machined from a solid billet of aluminium, or the bespoke one-off door handles, the leather trimmed interior and custom dashboard. 

All of this comes at a quite staggering cost. ICON is offering the Reformer Series Suburban for $1.1m, a figure seemingly more suited to a bespoke supercar than a slice of 1970s-era Detroit design. Ward and his team are at the cutting edge of something relatively new, and that’s the evolution of the custom car scene into something more akin to the art world. 

Although builders and enthusiasts have always treated custom cars as rolling sculptures, the 1970 Reformer goes further, evoking not just Mies van der Rohe’s steely perfection, but the intriguing installations of Donald Judd. As a powerful symbol of a vanishing age, this car says more than a thousand words.

For more details on ICON’s various projects visit ICON4x4.com

Previously known as the biennial Tokyo Motor Show, the newly re-branded Japan Mobility Show is making a fresh start after the cancellation of the 2021 event due to the pandemic. Wallpaper* has been reporting on this most esoteric of auto events since 2009 (you can read our past coverage here: 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2019). 

With mobility now understood to embrace everything from flying taxis to high-tech wheelchairs and self-driving hypercars, there was not so much as a single focus to the JMS. If anything, the most vocal trend was the embrace of video game culture and aesthetics, spearheaded by Nissan. The manufacturer not only gave its five concepts their own Manga-style avatar, but announced they’d be parachuted into the online world of Fortnite as player-operated vehicles. 

With the new decade well underway, what’s changed in the approach and what was there to look out for? Read on for the first part of our show report, covering concepts from Lexus, Toyota, Honda and Nissan.

Lexus: a new way of building cars

Lexus revealed two concepts that showed near-future models, both using a similar design language and overall feel. The Lexus LF-ZC is a battery electric saloon concept which gives strong clues of the 2026 production equivalent. It was joined by the Lexus LF-ZL, an electric SUV that would become the luxury carmaker’s new flagship model.

Lexus.co.uk

Lexus LF-ZC

Of the two concepts, the Lexus LF-ZC is lower and more sporting, demonstrating the company’s new “Provocative Simplicity” design theme, with a large cabin enveloped with sleek, creased bodywork. Inside, there’s the first iteration of the new Arene OS, a digital portal that is designed to evolve with the owner and adapt to their driving style.

Lexus LF-ZL

In comparison, the higher-riding Lexus LF-ZL focuses more acutely on the back seat experience, with a sliding rear door giving access into a cocooning, split-material environment that embodies the Japanese concept of Omotenashi, or mindful hospitality. 

Both cars also represent a shift in how Lexus plans to make its next generation Battery Electric Cars, dividing each vehicle body into three parts: front, centre and rear, with the battery pack housed in the centre. Part of this innovation is the ‘self-driving assembly line’, in which cars drive themselves through the production process, eliminating the need for conveyors. 

Toyota: mobility at every scale

Toyota’s clutch of concepts ranged from vast to micro-sized, with an electric bike and the JUU electric wheelchair concept joining an electric iteration of the iconic Land Cruiser, a new pick-up truck concept and a folding tricycle. 

Global.Toyota

Toyota Land Cruiser Se

Pick of the lot was the Land Cruiser Se, an inevitable evolution of the company’s legendarily robust off-roader. The Land Cruiser model has stalked the earth since 1951, and this newest iteration retains the rugged characteristics, adds in seating for seven and is a viable challenger for the most capable electric SUV on the planet.

Toyota Land Hopper

At the other end of the scale is the Land Hopper, an electric three-wheeler that folds up for storage in a car or pick-up. Pitched at last mile mobility and intended to be driven without a license in markets like Japan, the Land Hopper is designed to cater for all ages to maximise independence across society.

Toyota FT-Se and Toyota FT-3e

Future passenger cars were previewed by two other new concepts, the Toyota FT-Se and Toyota FT-3e. The latter is a crossover-style SUV, with raked rear screen, simple external graphics and the capability to be a portable power plant, whilst the FT-Se sports car concept got enthusiasts’ pulses racing.

This dramatic, low-slung two-seater implies that Toyota - like its rivals - still sees a valid future in electric performance vehicles.

Honda: marking 75 years of mobility design

Honda is marking its 75th anniversary in 2023 and unveiled a of new mobility products and concepts in celebration. These ranged from e-VTOL aircraft to autonomous mobility solutions for the elderly, taking in robotic assistants, micro-trucks and pocket-sized bikes. It also opened an AI-driven forum to invite visitors to the show to create their own visions of the future. Our five favourite reveals are listed below. 

Global.Honda

Honda Motorcompacto

First up, a delightfully minimal motorbike aimed at short urban journeys. With a top speed of around 15mph, this is the epitome of small footprint mobility, and a callback to Honda’s origins as a motorbike manufacturer.

Honda SUSTAINA-C Concept / Pocket Concept

A visual evolution of the ideas and ethos of the earlier Honda e, the SUSTAINA-C Concept explores manufacturing using removable panels made from sustainable materials.

The SUSTAINA-C was paired with the Pocket Concept, another micromobility machine that’s intended to be carried onboard a larger vehicle and then removed for that all important last mile journey. 

Honda Prelude Concept

The Prelude Concept looks practically production ready. As Honda’s first foray into the electric sports car arena, the company isn’t willing to overlook the fact that driving is still a pleasurable experience for many.

Honda Cruise Origin

The road to driverless cars is still peppered with obstacles, not least those that the cars themselves somehow keep missing. Honda isn’t daunted however, and has developed the Origin in collaboration with Cruise, the American autonomous car. 

A classic ‘box on wheels’, the Origin is dominated by the four hefty sensor packages at each corner, evoking the carriage lanterns of traditional horse-drawn coaches. Inside, there’s space for work and play, with a flexible interior that can be fully cocooned from the outside world. The company also announced a driverless ride-hail service in Japan for 2026, working together with GM and Cruise.

Honda eVTOL

Finally, an even more conceptual approach is taken with this eVTOL concept, which attempts to predict the form of urban mobility in the Thirties. Building on the experience the company garnered in building its own business aircraft, the HondaJet, this eVTOL machine is designed to integrate with other mobility systems, big and small.

Nissan goes Hyper

Nissan went to town at the Japan Mobility Show, exhibiting five related concept cars that attempted to splice the fast-paced world of online culture with the rather more placid realm of car design and manufacture. None of the five ‘Hyper’ projects shown here are scheduled for production, but they all make a nod to existing Nissans, past and present. Unified by a striking faceted design language, as well as dense information-laden interiors, each car is explicitly pitched at a certain demographic. 

Nissan.co.jp

Nissan Hyper Punk concept

The Nissan Hyper Punk is perhaps the most explicitly ‘trendy’ of the quintet, a small all-electric crossover that Nissan hope will appeal to ‘content creators, influencers, artists, and those who embrace style and innovation’ (its words). The design is described as being origami-styled, with screens everywhere, with a footprint that’s roughly analogous to the Nissan Juke. 

The internal screens can display manga-style imagery, generated by AI using footage captured by the onboard cameras. This ‘mobile creative studio’ is intended as a mobile riposte to the fast-moving world of graphics, gaming and modern culture.

Nissan Hyper Urban concept

The Hyper Urban concept is perhaps the most realistic of the five cars shown at JMS. This mid-size electric crossover evolves the company’s new Ariya EV and gives it an even more distinctive design. The kaleidoscopic interior is accessed via a quartet of butterfly doors, with seats inspired by sofas and easy chairs. Nissan suggests that it could even be used as an extension of your interior space. 

Nissan Hyper Tourer

The Hyper Tourer is another concept that cites the influence of omotenashi. Essentially a modern upgrade of the minivan – a hugely popular niche in Japan – the Hyper Tourer is a wedge-shaped living room on wheels, with fully autonomous capabilities and an interior inspired by traditional Japanese lattice woodworking. Swivelling front seats transform the interior into a meeting space or living room, while an AI-powered infotainment system serves up music and lighting according to your mood. 

Nissan Hyper Adventure concept

The Hyper Adventure is a conceptual vision of a traditional SUV like the current Nissan X-Trail. Like all the Hyper concepts, it has what Nissan is calling ‘V2X capability’, a power supply system that not only wirelessly charges devices but can also provide power to homes, businesses or even the local grid. 

Off-roading is made easier by the dashboard that doubles up as a visual display of the terrain ahead, and the landscape can be taken in in comfort from the rear bench, which swivels through 180 degrees to provide a seat in the wilderness.

Nissan Hyperforce Concept

Finally, there’s Nissan Hyper Force, a modern update of the company’s famed GT-R, often cited as one of the most high-tech and advanced performance road cars ever made. Described as a ‘hyper EV’, the Hyper Force certainly shares elements of the GT-R’s distinctive silhouette. 

All-wheel drive, with up to 1,000 kW of power, the intention is clearly to create a machine that honours the original, complete with two driving modes, ‘GT’ and ‘R’. Interior graphics were created in collaboration with Polyphony Digital Inc., the Japanese video game developer behind the Gran Turismo series.

Japan-Mobility-Show.com

Although a small city car might seem like a strange object to subject to a streetwear-branded partnership, there are plenty of precedents of fashion houses teaming up with auto brands to make more of a mark on an urban audience. Our favourites include Cadillac’s partnership with Gucci back in the late 1970s, Karl Lagerfeld’s stealthily sybaritic BMW 7-Series from 2000, and the humble Peugeot 205 Lacoste edition, launched in 1985. 

Toyota approached the Japanese designer Jun Takahashi, founder of the Undercover label, to add some stylish zip to its entry-level Aygo X. This is a likeable car, an upgrade of the earlier Aygo, that was given a light fettling in 2022 with the addition of a boosted ride height and a chunkier stance. 

By virtue of it being small, relatively inexpensive and easy to insure, Toyota has always staked the Aygo’s claim to the youth market – it was even given a starring role in its own manga comic back when it originally launched in 2014. In truth, the Aygo demographic probably skews into more mature territory, which begs the question as to whether Takahashi’s take will find favour. 

The designer founded Undercover in 1990, emerging from Tokyo’s Harajuku district, a cauldron of sub-cultural creation from the late 1970s onwards. This was Takahashi’s first car project, and the designer noted how different it was to conventional clothing collaborations. ‘Fusing together two contradicting elements, or worlds, is exciting for me.’

As with all designer editions, little flashes of bold identity are scattered around the car, inside and out. We like the splashes of coral red on the wheels and inside the cabin, especially on the monogram-patterned floor mats. The seats also get Undercover branding, but the addition of two roof decals bearing Takahashi’s Chaos/Balance catchwords err on the side of kitsch.

Launched at Paris Fashion Week S/S 2024, the Undercover edition is being limited to 5,000 examples across Europe. Strictly petrol only, the Aygo X is hardly the most high-tech venture, nor is it the kind of car you’d want to regularly subject to long, long drives. The little 1.0-litre engine struggles on steep gradients and acceleration can be conspicuously absent, even on the level.

This is a car whose character doesn’t rely on raucous sounds or ill-defined luxury; the function is in no way compromised by Takahashi’s added extras (one essential cost option is the JBL premium audio system, although helpful things like the wireless smartphone charging tray come as standard). The car’s small scale gives it a playful spirit, a welcome counterpoint to the relentlessly escalating size of almost everything else. Who knows, in decades to come, the Aygo X Undercover might even find itself with a cult following of its own. 

Toyota Aygo X Undercover, from £20,095, Toyota.co.uk

In some respects, the launch of Toyota’s new Century SUV is the sad end of an era. Outside of JDM (Japanese Domestic Market) car enthusiasts, not many people know that Toyota’s Japanese product line-up includes the company’s equivalent of a Rolls-Royce, a massive limousine explicitly designed for captains of industry and powered by a bespoke V12 engine. 

The first Toyota Century arrived in 1967 in an attempt to wrestle the chauffeur-driven market away from Western manufacturers. It was so successful that the first generation remained in production for 30 years until an all-new Century model arrived in 1997. 

Throughout this time, the Century was discreetly marketed and deliberately low-key – almost all Centuries are painted black. The second-generation model maintained this stealth-wealth ethos, surviving for a remarkable 20 years until the current Century Sedan was launched in 2017 (losing the V12 in favour of a hybrid V8).

Now Toyota seems in danger of throwing that hard-won discretion out of the window with the launch of the new Century SUV. For a start, there are colours aside from black, but there’s also a totally different scale and stance to the new vehicle. For the first time, the Century name will officially be sold overseas, which perhaps explains why Toyota has adopted this relatively modern symbol of status. 

There’s something innately standoffish about most SUVs, thanks largely to their sheer size. Whilst Toyota is one of the last entrants into the luxury SUV sector, its rivals singularly failed to capture the qualities of their equivalent sedan/saloon offerings; a Rolls-Royce Cullinan will never trump a Ghost, let alone a Phantom; Bentley’s Bentayga doesn’t have the timeless grace of the Flying Spur, and so on. 

Whilst industrious executives thrived on the anonymity of the original Century (wool seats for quiet softness, not the gauche squeakiness of leather), the SUV version lifts you above the crowd. The bluff sides of the sedan have a certain retro simplicity; translated into 4x4, and all you see is vertical metal cliffs – a clear hint of Cullinan.

Inside, the added scale allows for more space for lounging, with ultra-wide opening rear doors and seats that recline practically into beds, along with a host of relaxation options, including an acoustic environment calibrated by a ‘musical instrument manufacturing master’.  

Craftsmanship is used everywhere in the Century range, with bodywork fashioned from aluminium in the traditional way and details like the phoenix emblem on the radiator grille engraved by hand. JDM aficionados will be pleased to see the retention of the traditional style lace seat covers, although they might not pass luxury muster in certain foreign markets. 

Up front, the cabin is relatively austere – this is after all a place for a chauffeur to work. The 3.5-litre V6 is mated to a plug-in hybrid system, with the idea being that around town, batteries are all you’ll ever need.

Although Century sedan retains its crown as the world’s most discreet luxury car, you can still find specialists willing to make it a little more OTT – Japanese tuning company WALD will lower the ride and fit bigger wheels, for example. Even so, it’s hardly in your face. 

The Century’s new SUV sibling is designed to shake things up. However, can the Toyota badge transcend its mass-market associations to make the Century SUV a true rival for the likes of Bentley, Rolls-Royce and Mercedes-Maybach?

Toyota.jp

WALD.co.jp

The Toyota Aygo X is exactly the kind of car that EVs are struggling to quash. Whilst SUVs and GTs and all manner of brawny, large vehicles are well suited to the battery-lugging requirements of electric propulsion, small city cars are a far trickier premise. 

At 3.7m long, the Aygo X is truly diminutive by modern standards (although as a point of reference, the ‘classic’ original Mini was just over 3m long). Bung in a battery, and the balance between cost, weight, performance and range fails to stack up. Hence the Aygo X sensibly sticks with a combustion engine.

Toyota Aygo X: a compact workhorse

Does that blunt this car’s appeal? Not really. For a start, there are simply no electric equivalents. The similarly sized Volkswagen E-up! has a range of 159 miles (and was recently removed from the market), whilst the excellent Honda e has a range of only 137 miles, yet costs twice the price of the Aygo X. The Mini Electric is similarly attractive but hamstrung by price and range. 

But these are city cars, we hear you say, designed for short journeys where a zero-emission vehicle makes the most sense. Unfortunately, range and scale mean that all the above tend to work best as second cars, playing support vehicle to a much larger, long-range machine (be it EV or ICE). 

Not so with the Aygo. While it’s hardly a cruiser, the little three-cylinder 1.0 litre engine keeps the light, compact machine apace with traffic, even if no performance records are going to be troubled. The five-speed manual is another throwback, and the ultra-light clutch and steering take a bit of getting used to. Once acclimatised, the Aygo X demonstrates an appealing character, a trusty, compact workhorse that feels nigh-on unbreakable.

Part of this comes from the ‘SUV-lite’ styling cues that give this Aygo the ‘X’ designation (the original Aygo is no longer made). Although they amount to little more than a slightly raised ride height and chunky plastic trim that gives the impression of two-tone bodywork, it’s effective enough, implying a classless kind of utility. 

Space in the back is somewhat tight and the boot will encourage you to pack light. The top of the range model adds in a canvas roof, that timeless signifier of low-rent luxury, but pairs it with an 8in touchscreen and both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. You even get a reversing camera, somewhat superfluous in this compact machine.

The Aygo X (the X is pronounced ‘cross’) is a modern equivalent of a Citroen 2CV or a Renault 4 or even the long-forgotten Toyota Starlet; a little dash of the unexpected, mixed in with a whole lot of common sense and engineering solidity. This is precisely the kind of car that tomorrow’s EVs need to target.  

Toyota Aygo X, from £15,990, Air Edition as tested, from £19,380, Toyota.co.uk

Kia’s rise into the car design premier league is confirmed by the EV9, its slick, full-electric, flush-door-handled, five-to-seven-seat large SUV. Stage one of the Korean car brand’s transformation from ‘low-cost and value-led’ to ‘reasonable and reliable’ came via ex-Audi designer Peter Schreyer from 2006. In 2015, ex-Bentley and Lamborghini designer Luc Donckerwolke joined the team – replacing Schreyer as chief design officer of Kia’s parent company Hyundai Motor Group in 2017 – and steadily upped the ante via award-winning cars including the EV6.

Meantime, its fortunes have steadily risen, Hyundai Motor Group becoming the third-biggest vehicle manufacturer in the world in 2022 with 6.83m sales. That places it behind only the VW Group (7.85m) and Toyota (10.1m). Compared to sister brand Hyundai, Kia is the smaller player with 2.9m sales, but is now nonetheless a major brand in its own right, easily outselling, for example, Mercedes (2.04m), BMW Group (2.3m) and Tesla (1.3m).

Since October 2019 ex-BMW designer Karim Habib became Kia’s senior design VP and the 2023 EV9 is the first Kia created under his direction. While sharing the same electric-only platform and naming strategy as the compact crossover EV6 launched in 2021, the large EV9 is a visual departure, especially in its exterior. The design is more geometric and less soft-surfaced than the EV6, and the Kias that will arrive in the next few years – to populate the missing numbers in the rest of its EV range – will follow this approach. 

Kia EV9, an all-electric SUV

What is also pleasing is that the production vehicle isn’t so far removed from the EV9 concept car revealed at the Automobility LA 2021 show. That’s because both concept and production car were developed at the same time, as Habib confirms: ‘The concept was pulled out of the process of the production car and the designs were by the same Turkish designer, Berk Erner, from our Californian studio.’

Where the production car differs most from the concept’s proportions is in its height – it has less ground clearance, partly for aerodynamic reasons – but also in other small changes. ‘The production car’s bonnet is shorter, the cabin longer and the beltline definitely lower than on the concept,’ Habib says. ‘In its glass-to-body proportion, it’s less-classical SUV, but that was all part of the message of this “living space” architecture.‘

That ‘living space’ cabin is also a significant move on from the EV6 and was developed in Korea, led by senior VP of interior design Jochen Peasen. The Belgian designer – behind the interior concept that became the BMW i8 earlier in his career – has created a similarly floating monochrome interior for the EV9, albeit in simpler form here. He describes his aesthetic vision as ‘the antithesis of the over-busy interior design approach of other SUVs and concentrating on negative space and shadow‘. 

In final production guise, that translates to elements like the dashboard, screen, internal grab handles and door and centre armrests all appearing to float within the cabin’s shell via carefully hidden attachment points. Sitting on the dashboard like a slim, frameless TV, that instrument panel is made up of a large 27-inch screen with a trio of slim screens underneath covering driver display and central touchscreen infotainment. Paesen says this system represents an upgrade from the one within the EV6 and confirms that it will be rolled out across the Kia range.  

The SUV also gets a new chamfered steering wheel design that flattens its top to make viewing that driver display easier, while all of the key physical driver controls are clustered around the steering column to avoid visual clutter elsewhere – the only other major controls being quick-reach, centrally located buttons for air-conditioning and volume control. 

More functional ability reveals itself in the back, where the EV9 can accommodate five-to-seven people with a level of flexibility more associated with MPVs. In six-seat mode, the EV9’s second-row captain-style chairs can do a 180-degree turn. First through 90 degrees to face the rear door opening to allow easier entry and exit, and then on to 180 degrees, to face rearward to the third-row seats, creating a neat lounge space for convivial face-to-face chats when parked up, while recharging or resting, or both. 

Sat in the third-row with the second-row seats facing forward, it’s a bit tight for passenger knees, due to flat, rather than hollowed-out seat backs in front, but on a positive note this design does improve loading functionality when second- and third-row seats are folded. A large boot is promised (no volume figures have been given yet) and there’s also a sizeable ‘frunk’ under the bonnet lid able to carry charging cables and a bit more.

The cabin is a vegan, leather-free space, using recycled PET within many of its materials, and although the colour palette, on the two early vehicles we saw, both featured muted shades of grey, Paesen says brighter options will be available from the EV9’s late-2023 on-sale date. ‘We wanted a two-tone approach, with less chrome, less gloss black and more fabric. But other colours are coming.’ 

The Kia EV9 is firmly targeting practicality with its style and should be aided in that pursuit by a circa 337-mile electric range and 800-volt rapid charging capability. Prices are set to start from £65,000, which is a lot of money for any car – and this brand especially – but with the EV9, former Korean ‘also-ran’ Kia, is now definitely one of the ‘leaders of the pack’.

Kia.com

On the face of it, the Toyota Yaris family is the very picture of conformity, a collection of polite compact cars with global appeal and no desire to rock the boat. The ‘Yaris’ name – apparently derived from the Charites, the Greek goddesses of beauty – has been around since 1999.

From the first generation onwards, the template has remained the same, a compact supermini-style car for markets around the world, with some subtle body variants depending on regional taste (sedans for Asia and South America, hatchbacks for Europe).

Most Yaris customers are either very young or very old, and the basic car exudes a classless pragmatism that is largely missing from today’s brand-driven marketplace.

In the past there’s also been a mini MPV, the Yaris Verso (although admittedly the Japan-market name was better – the Toyota FunCargo), and for those in the know, there’s also the exceptionally good GR Yaris, a cultish high-performance version that shares a family likeness but little else with the stock machine.

This is the Yaris Cross, built in France using the same platform as the regular flavour Yaris. As you can see, it is a tough little cookie, with pumped-up suspension and the black plastic wheel arches and body trim that have become visual shorthand for ‘utility’ and practicality.

Although it obviously rides a little higher than the standard car, the Yaris Cross is precisely the same length, at 4.1m. A hybrid power unit pairs a 3-cylinder engine with a rear-mounted electric motor, and the car benefits from Toyota’s multi-million unit experience of combining battery power with an internal combustion engine, making it extremely efficient and easy to use.

Everything about the Yaris Cross is modest and unassuming. Despite the jacked-up styling, it’s hardly aggressive, with a friendly face and compact dimensions. Much has been written about the validity of driving big SUVs in cities, but smaller crossovers like this make far more sense.

The elevated driving position puts you closer to eye level with cyclists and pedestrians, and the little Yaris is well proportioned without relying on excessively awkward styling elements.

The interior includes a ubiquitous touch screen display but goes the analogue route for heating and ventilation, and there are useful trays and pockets for bits and pieces scattered around the cabin. The steering is light and responsive, with the battery giving a welcome added zip to the acceleration.

At highway speeds, the Cross isn’t quite as smooth and silent as an EV equivalent, but it is comfortable, well-equipped, and perfectly capable of serving as an effective long-distance machine as well as a runaround.

Car use is changing fast. Compact hybrids are still a compelling proposition for a small(ish) car, even if the tech is relatively complex. And being a Toyota, one expects the Yaris Cross will last forever.

In fact, we suspect that when the curtains finally come down on the combustion engine’s access to major city centres, the Yaris Cross will still be going strong, even if it no longer has an urban environment to play in.

INFORMATION

Toyota Yaris Cross, from £28,950

Toyota.co.uk

It says a lot for the design integrity of the Volvo V90 that it still looks fresh and modern after five years on the market. With only mild tweaks to the design, the V90 remains the epitome of the graceful modern estate car, just as its sister, the S90, represents the apogee of internally combusted saloon car design.

Penned by a team led by Thomas Ingenlath, shortly before he departed Volvo to become the first CEO of Polestar, Volvo’s spin-off performance EV brand, there’s not a line out of place. Even more impressively, the lines that are there further a convincing heritage that goes back to the very earliest Volvo models.

Volvo V90 Recharge

This is not a retro car, although in the context of the contemporary car market, the estate car format has become rather old-fashioned. The alternative is the ubiquitous SUV, a genre that Volvo does rather well with the XC40, XC60 and XC90. But estate cars – or wagons – are where the company’s heritage lies, so it’s fitting that one of its flagship products remains firmly wedded to the genre.

The V90 (V for Versatile) is now available as a ‘Recharge’ plug-in hybrid model. Despite Polestar’s enthusiastic embrace of electrification, Volvo itself is lagging slightly behind. Right now, the only fully electrified Volvos on the market are the XC40 and the forthcoming C40; the midsize and larger models like S60, V60, XC60, XC90, S90 and V90 are all too old to be efficiently electrified. Instead, the brand has hybridised its fleet.

Like any plug-in hybrid, the V90 Recharge can be run for short distances on full electric power. The V90 promises nearly 53 miles of electric range. Given the average UK driver does 131 miles per week (the figure is 259 miles per week in the USA), then it’s not impossible for a charger-equipped household to run this car as an EV for the vast majority of the time. Like all hybrids, the Recharge system works best when both kinds of engine work together.

Volvo is seemingly alone in abandoning the unnecessary theatre around performance and ‘sport’ driving, but it’s not missed here. This is a big, comfortable car, with architectural levels of space, and a satisfyingly long-lasting feel to every control and surface. Even the touchscreen is well thought-out and easy to use, despite being a few years off the pace in terms of technology.

Having Google effectively built into the car certainly helps, as the tech giant’s Assistant is far smarter than all the other in-car intelligences put together. However, this approach might alienate diehard fans of certain other mobile operating systems. Safety is also baked into this company’s DNA, although the newest innovations are systems that prevent crashes from happening in the first place, rather than the protection you’re afforded should the worst happen. The latter tends to be taken for granted, while the former demands intensive research and technological know-how. For the driver, this means a forest of sensors, scanning every nook and cranny of your surroundings for errant cyclists or wayward pedestrians. It’s a credit to the engineers that the V90 never lulls you into a false sense of security; these extra eyes work best to supplement your own. 

The V90’s enduring physical qualities translate very nicely into the contemporary image of Scandinavian design and culture, an association the company plays up wherever possible. You can hardly blame it; after slow design, slow food, and slow architecture, Volvo is probably the best example of ‘slow motoring’ there is, not that any other car makers are clamouring to make this association. But you know what we mean; slow is a synonym for sustainable and Volvo has aggressive in-house plans to become a fully circular business by 2040. 

Volvo Concept Recharge

An indication of how Volvo’s signature appearance might evolve to meet these objectives is the Concept Recharge, a concept car that represents both future form language and how design can alter a car’s lifetime environmental impact.

Halfway between an SUV and an estate, the Volvo Concept Recharge is kitted out in sustainable materials (including Swedish wool, flax composite, and a new Volvo-invented leather replacement material called Nordico, made from sustainably managed forests in Sweden and Finland). The flax composite also forms some of the body panels, while even the Pirelli tyres are 94 per cent free of fossil fuels.

Concept Recharge also makes a decent fist of streamlining the notoriously boxy SUV profile, with a lower roofline, less aggressive styling, and an aerodynamically efficient chopped tail. The flat floor allows for an expansive interior, so it matches the cavernous Volvos of old, while all the efficiencies help bolster the range and lower the environmental impact.

Volvo has been making cars that last longer and go further for 94 years, helping cement an enviable image of security and reliability. As we zoom into the electric era, slow and steady could still come out ahead.

INFORMATION

Volvo V90 Hybrid, from £57,525, model as tested, £62,750 

volvocars.com

Toyota GR Yaris has garnered a cult following straight out of the box. Usually, such cars are almost impossible to create. By their very nature, cult objects are freak collisions of ambition, innovation and scarcity, hitting an invisible mark that might not be apparent for many years after their debut.

This particular machine was created first and foremost for competition. Harking back to the days when manufacturers had to make road-going versions of their most outlandish competition cars in order to meet eligibility rules, the GR Yaris was developed by Toyota’s Finland-based Gazoo Racing World Rally Team, the outfit responsible for successfully bringing the brand back to the World Rally Championship.

To the layperson, the connection between a compact city car and a rally-winning performance machine might not be apparent, but the GR team have taken the stock Yaris – the European Car of the Year 2021, no less – and transformed it into something almost unrecognisable. For a start, there are the physical changes. The GR is lower, wider and has two less doors than the conventional Yaris. It also has four-wheel-drive and a new 1.6-litre 3 Cylinder turbo-charged engine. Body panels are aluminium and carbon composite, while inside there are supportive sports seats. In fact, practically the only bits this car has in common with the award-winning Yaris hatchback are the lights and wing mirrors. It’s functional, rather than beautiful, although its diminutive scale is surely one of its most attractive qualities. 

If you like driving, the GR Yaris ticks every box. Thanks to its ultra-compact size, finely tuned steering and responsive engine, this little machine delivers zest and agility that evokes a classic race or rally car. In terms of enjoment, it can runs rings around hypercars costing many times its price, whether on the road or on the track and while this is by means a limited edition (about 25,000 will be made in total), it’s sufficiently different to impress the aficionados.

In fact, owning a GR implies a certain amount of insider knowledge, as well as tapping into the complex inverse snobbery of the niche performance brand. With all forms of electric racing and rallying gathering pace, we’ll probably not see the likes of the GR Yaris again, making this both a cult car and an instant collectable. Long after the last supercar is extinct, this robust little Yaris might still have a chance to roam free.

INFORMATION

Toyota GR Yaris, from £29,995
toyota.co.uk

Toyota is one of the most sophisticated car makers on the planet, with a vast global product range and a typical annual output of 10.725 million vehicles (in 2019). As its press office points out, that’s a car every three seconds. Quite a few of those cars are RAV4s, the company’s long-running ‘mid-size’ SUV. When this model first debuted back in 1994 it was a genuine breath of fresh air, a compact, high-riding ‘Recreational Activity Vehicle’ that scratched a hitherto unknown consumer itch for a robustly styled car that evoked the go-anywhere qualities of an off-roader without complexity or weight.

There was an even an early electric version (albeit sold only in California at the turn of the century). As it matured, the RAV4 grew in scale and the simple design of the original gave way to Toyota’s off-kilter assemblage of scoops, curves and vents. The new model, the fifth generation, continues the company’s wayward aesthetic, endearing only because the function and technology are so refined. To our eyes at least, the Toyota aesthetic seems to be coalescing into something a bit more interesting than ugly, although the high, boxy proportions of this SUV are still somewhat challenging.

There are good reasons why the majority of plug-in hybrids and pure electric cars maintain the trend for SUVs. For a start, bigger cars have space for complex hybrid systems or the battery volume needed to quell range anxiety. But SUVs also make good profits, all the more essential in an industry that operates with wafer thin margins. However, as recent reports have attested, the benefits of low to zero-emission technology are being offset by the trend towards bigger cars. Hence the RAV4 unwittingly sits at the intersection of all these conflicting demands and desires. It’s a great car, built on Toyota’s New Global Architecture (TNGA) platform. This modular system gives the company the massive flexibility it needs to produce everything from Daihatsu Kei cars through to luxury saloons, pure electric cars and big SUVs.

This is engineering driven by raw economics, and it’s testament to Toyota’s engineering acumen that the RAV4 glides and rides with impressive grace. It has a peerless hybrid system, honed over decades of experience. It is comfortable, practical, and easy to drive, if not quite so easy on the eye, although the newly announced ‘Hybrid Black Edition’, finished in a fashionably dark colour wave inside and out, giving its unconventional angles a fresh foil. The auto industry is walking an increasingly fine line between utility and desire. Big might be profitable for now, but at some point, we’re all going to have to downsize.

INFORMATION

Toyota RAV4 Dynamic 4x2, as tested £34,485
toyota.co.uk

Long known for its conceptual bias, the 46th edition of the Tokyo Motorshow was again filled with Japanese brands showing full-size vehicle prototypes imagining near and far-out futures. With the 2020 Tokyo Olympics just around the corner, most of those makers, especially Toyota as a key sponsor, pulled out all the stops to showcase various eco-improved mobility solutions for all of society’s needs – not just the able-bodied and young – from electric kei cars, to self-driving minivans and large fuel cell limos. Read on for the Top Ten Tokyo 2019 Motor Show concepts, as curated by Wallpaper*.

Lexus LF-30: Pitched as a circa 2030 future electric vision concept – thus the concept’s letters and numbers – the LF-30 is what a limo-sized EV could look like in ten years’ time. With designers seizing the packaging and space opportunities afforded by in-wheel electric motors and a more compact solid-state (as opposed to lithium-ion) battery powertrain, the driver-focused four-seat cabin offers more space than the current Lexus LS. Joystick-style steering controls for the driver resemble those of a horse rider’s reins, symbolically pushing the notion of man and machine in similar harmony, while the front passenger has access to a large infotainment screen set forward and low on their side of the dash. The front seats feature tensioned strips of material across the seat backs to create more light and alongside a black wood floor, white driver’s seat and grey Alcantara passenger seats. Design lead Ian Cartabiano describes the whole ensemble as “warm and inviting but also a bit dark and mysterious too.” We agree.

Mitsubishi Mi-Tech: The 4x4 and EV specialist Mitsubishi showed its skills in both of those departments with its plug-in hybrid SUV Mi-Tech concept. The compact and chunky open-top buggy features a built-in gas turbine generator instead of a conventional petrol engine that can run on various fuels according to local availability – from diesel to kerosene and even alcohol – and a full-width and height augmented reality-enhanced head-up display windscreen aims to keep the driver’s eyes informed while also focused on the road ahead.

Toyota E-Racer (and friends): Toyota had so many electric concepts on its stand it was hard to keep count. They numbered at least a dozen – from robots to delivery pods and people movers – but despite these AI-enabled, on-demand mobility aids, Toyota’s senior management seemed most excited by the single-seater e-Racer pitched as an antidote to the machines taking over completely. As Simon Humphries, Toyota’s global head of design, told Wallpaper*: “If we can harness shared autonomous driving and those things that really give the ultimate freedom in mobility, with all your nine-to-five, Monday-to-Friday needs met by that eco system, then the car you actually buy doesn’t need to be an all-rounder anymore. You can just buy an open, no-doors, no-roof, adrenaline rush.” Sounds good.

Nissan IMk & Ariya: Nissan rarely disappoints at the Tokyo Motor Show and the 2019 expo proved its concept game is still tight. A duo of electric concepts – the Ariya compact SUV and IMk city car – represent the two ‘bookends’ of the brand’s new design vision dubbed ‘Timeless Japanese Futurism’. Each exterior has ultra-slim lights and retains a large shield-like grille but as they no longer need to suck in air to cool a combustion engine, to create depth and interest both feature elaborate LED light displays instead. Flowing body surfacing is punctuated by precise light and metal details to keep the exteriors simple and that theme is continued on the inside with smooth dashboards with embedded controls on the Ariya and a bezel-less holographic driver display projected ‘mid-air’ within the IMk.

Suzuki Hanare & Waku Spo: Suzuki’s twin concepts envisioned a far-future 2040 minivan and mid-future 2030 small car. The Hanare is a perfectly symmetrical MPV that envisages a fully-autonomous electric vehicle where friends and family can relax in private, as denoted by the markedly high window line on both sides. Seating comes in the form of a rear lounger that can face forward or swivel in an arc to watch a big 60-inch screen, while simpler front seats descend into a flat floor when not required. As a car that drives itself, no steering wheel or instrument panel is offered. Also of note was the Suzuki Waku Spo plug-in hybrid, with its non-symmetrical three-box silhouette (longer bonnet, shorter boot). The Waku Spo is also a transformer of sorts, able to morph from sedan to wagon, via a rear wood-effect deck that rises skyward alongside a hidden extra rear glass window. Truly transformational.

Daihatsu TsumuTsumu: Daihatsu offered four concepts on its 2019 Tokyo exhibition stand from a rugged small SUV for outdoor adventures (the WakuWaku) to a mobile people mover for the elderly or holiday makers with lots of luggage (the Icolco). But the one that caught our eye most was the TsumuTsumu (Daihatsu clearly likes to name their concepts twice). The slab-fronted, no-grille green truck channeled Japanese robot helmet-style vibes for its cab while showcasing an interchangeable cargo load box at the rear. The exhibition stand version featured a sizeable drone inside imagined as a crop-spraying tool for farmers but could equally be swapped for a box that acted as a private interior space for humans too.

Toyota Auto Body PMCV: Cool-looking boxy minivans are a very Japanese thing. And arguably the best manufacturer of them all is Toyota Auto Body – the truck division of the massive automotive corporation – which since late 2018 now oversees the two dozen or so commercial vehicle-related minivan and 4x4 passenger cars that Toyota sells, including the Alphard, Voxy, Noah, Hiace and Land Cruiser. Its standout 2019 Tokyo exhibit was the shapely and innovative PMCV (Personal Multi-Compact Vehicle) envisaged as a Level 4-autonomous electric minivan for the year 2030. With configurable seats for up to seven occupants or down to just one via various fold-ups-and-aways, the PMCV can switch from a cabin loaded with people to a transporter of bulky items like surfboards and bicycles. Only 4600mm in length, the PMCV’s massive cabin cleverly fills almost all of that space – its large windscreen extends to the very front of the vehicle and there is no traditional bonnet – and was one of the freshest concepts at the expo.

All GaN For Future: The prize for ‘Most fun car of the 2019 Tokyo Motor Show’ could well be won by the All GaN For Future concept. Information on the electric city car was super-scarce and mainly in Japanese, but that just made the rakishly wedged two-plus-two-seater all the more enigmatic. After some digging and Google-translating what we did glean is that the 3050mm long, 1650mm wide and 1500mm high zero-emission city car has a fold-flat-into-the-floor rear bench seat, features a high-efficiency in-vehicle inverter which can cut CO2 by 20% and has been developed by Nagoya University, the Japanese Ministry of the Environment and the Toyota Advanced Power Electronics Research Division. Big-hitters all, suggesting that the eye-catching All GaN’s exterior –which evokes Japanese custom truck designs plus a sprinkling of Giugiaro-familiar design cues – houses some serious future function to go with its striking form.

INFORMATION

tokyo-motorshow.com

The new Toyota Supra is that increasingly rare beast – certainly from a metropolitan perspective; it is a car designed purely around the joy of driving. Throughout modern history, regardless of the strictures on automobile use, there have always been purist sports cars, and perhaps there always will. It’s telling, however, that the world’s largest car maker, still feels that such a microscopic niche is worth the effort. Yet unusually for Toyota, this car is a co-production, developed in close collaboration with BMW and sharing a chunk of its mechanicals, along with its Austrian production line, with BMW’s new Z4 Roadster.

In a straightforward battle of aesthetics, the Toyota wins hands down over the Z4, but there’s still something frustratingly contrived about the way the long nosed, stubby-tailed shape is detailed. The proportions are the best bit, for this is a classic sports car layout that somehow never gets old. Certainly some of the design elements are spot on, like the Zagato-style double-bubble roof (a nod to Toyota’s iconic 1967 2000GT) and steeply raked rear screen, but the bulbous rear flanks and clutch of fake vents that bleed out of the edges of the front and rear light clusters, in the doors and on the bonnet don’t bear close scrutiny. They might look purposeful but are too much of a blatant nod to the Supra’s historic role as a car for tweakers, customisers and lairy performance enthusiasts (you will struggle to find an example of the earlier Supra’s in pristine, factory fresh condition).

There’ll no doubt be a burgeoning aftermarket for the new car as well, which seems destined to follow its forebears to cult status. Right now, however, the Supra is new, rare and very much in demand. Toyota will only bring about 300 cars a year to the UK market, and they’re all already spoken for. Such was the buzz around this car, carefully built up over five years, that the first production model off the line was sold at a US charity auction for £1.63m. If you can find one, you’ll pay substantially less (albeit probably still over the odds to beat the queue). The Supra lines up alongside impressive competitors, including Alpine’s A110, Porsche’s evergreen 718 Cayman and perhaps the ageing Lotus Evora. Does it have what it takes to beat them?

While BMW went in a different direction with its half of the project and built a roadster for cruising, there’s a sense that the Supra isn’t an outright sports car either. Instead, it’s a swift super coupé, a tightly wound grand tourer that’s far more usable than the Lotus, less characterful than the Alpine and marginally less of an all-rounder like the Porsche. You’re almost always aware of the car’s weight, with poise and balance that isn’t quite as confidence inspiring as the Alpine or Porsche. Modern cars handle so well, that it’s a surprise to be handed something with a slightly twitchy character. This is obviously a big plus for some drivers; they’ll be taking their cars on a track at every opportunity. It’s also a bigger, more brutish machine than the GT86, Toyota’s well-respected, compact sports car that it introduced seven years ago (and still makes).

The BMW heritage is especially obvious on the interior, where practically every element comes from Munich, from the switches to the graphics. This is apparently due to the enormous complexity of the modern car, where software is so embedded in the hardware, that the shared engine demanded most of the code be ported over as well. If you need the code, you also need the interface, and so on. At this point, BMW’s software is arguably better than Toyota, but the German company's trademark skew-whiff cabin architecture and dash aesthetics only serve to highlight the Supra’s complex heritage. But that’s the modern car industry in a nutshell, a smorgasbord of influences and references served up on a bed of platform sharing and industrial collaborations.

The new Supra is a worthy bearer of the name. It might be a tad anachronistic in its ambitions, but this is hardly going to dissuade the enthusiasts – quite the opposite. For the rest of us, it demonstrates that in order to stand out, conventionally powered cars need a real point of difference as they near the end of their existence. As a result, the Supra has been designed to guarantee its future classic status.

INFORMATION
Toyota Supra, from £52,695. toyota.co.uk

Car manufacturing is one of the most highly evolved industrial processes in history. Billions of cars have been built over the past century, with each and every one serving exactly the same purpose. Over time, the process of making cars has become refined to the point of perfection; arguably it is now technology and usage requirements that have been left behind.

Such big questions spring to mind when you get behind the wheel of the latest iteration of Toyota’s venerable Corolla, now the best-selling car nameplate of all time. The name was first introduced in 1966 and has remained a constant in the Toyota range ever since. This newest version is the 12th generation of a nameplate that has sold 45 million examples to date, defiantly occupying the middle market in terms of taste, price and presentation. It is the Samsung Galaxy of cars, as opposed to the iPhone, a technological marvel whose many innovations have been normalised over literally decades of production and millions of examples.

And not just any production. The Toyota method of making stuff is the de facto standard for the modern car factory, a form of just-in-time manufacturing that focuses with laser-like intensity on every detail, constantly honing processes until there is not a wasted second or superfluous screw. Toyota’s own educational material suggests that the 30,000 or so components that go into a car can be assembled from raw material into finished product in around 17-18 hours, regardless of whether that’s at the mothership factories in Nagoya, or its many subsidiaries around the world, including Burnaston in Derbyshire, which assembles Corollas for Europe.

In the past, such mechanised perfection might have brought accusations of bland, personality-free products. To a certain extent, they would be right, but there’s no place for banality in the current car market; character is as fundamental to a successful car as efficiency and safety. The Corolla’s character has definitely evolved and while no-one would call this car the life and soul of a parking lot, the new model is light years ahead of its forebears and frankly the equal of any comparable car on sale today. While the big German and French brands shout loudly about heritage, design and dynamics, the Corolla just gets on quietly with being really, really good.

A seamless hybrid system, refined through the company’s ongoing intensive focus on the technology, underpins this top spec Excel 2.0 Hatchback. There are lower specs (including hybrid-free models) and smaller engines available, as well as a pricier and marginally more practical Touring Sports model, but the hybrid is the sweet spot. Designed to maximise the amount of time you spend running on pure electric power, Toyota’s full hybrid system captures as much regenerative charge as possible from the engine and brakes, all the while tracking your ability to be efficient.

In some hybrids, this gamification of the driving process is a welcome distraction from the fact the car itself is rather dull, but the new Corolla doesn’t let the side down anywhere. It’s more than pleasant to drive, the interior spec is high with good infotainment and mapping, the hybrid is smooth, the ride relaxing and to top it all, it’s actually pretty decent to look at. In fact, we’d go so far as to say that this is one of the most refined mass-market Japanese car designs of recent years, with curves and swoops that finally have purpose and cohesion. It’s far from showy, of course, and brand imagery and associations have a long, long tail, so many might dismiss this car out of hand without giving it a chance. They shouldn’t, because the newest Corolla is a fine piece of contemporary design and an even better car.

INFORMATION
Toyota Corolla Excel 2.0 hybrid, from £27,555. toyota.co.uk

To the casual observer, the Toyota Land Cruiser is an automotive anachronism, a craggy island adrift from mainstream thinking about the evolution of car design. The current car – seen here – dates from around 2009 although it received a substantial tech and styling update in 2018. How does it match up with the fiercely competitive big SUV sector? The Land Cruiser model has been around in one form or another for over 60 years. Originally launched in the early 1950s as a naked imitation of the wartime American Jeep, the Land Cruiser has slowly evolved into one of the most venerable of all motor cars, unbreakable and unstoppable.

These qualities are obviously important in the Australian Outback or sub-Saharan Africa, but perhaps less so when it comes to everyday roads. It might not have escaped your notice that the SUV boom shows no sign of abating and practically every manufacturer has a high-riding model on their books. But while most SUVs and crossovers are becoming more car-like and civilised in their driving style and appearance, the Land Cruiser has remained steadfastly old fashioned.

The earliest models have now earned their retro chic, with companies like ICON in LA restoring them to levels of industrial design perfection that far exceed their original quality. With the best will in the world, there’s nothing especially attractive about the current car. It is upright, bluff, and uncompromising, all the better for forging rivers, rambling across the savanna and tackling steep gradients. While other marques use the imposing scale of SUVs to convey a sense of grandeur and status, a Land Cruiser is rather more modest, if only because it implies a certain insouciance on the part of the owner about things like brands and style.

Inside, there are more updates, with a thin veneer of technology over the underpinnings of pure tradition. It all works as you’d expect, with touchscreen infotainment and plenty of buttons, knobs and dials – this is not the realm of glassy digital dashboards. A new 4-cylinder diesel engine delivers ample but languorous performance, with a bunch of dedicated off-road transmission controls to dig you out of the deepest bog. Toyota undeniably has the nous to build for the future – over four million Priuses (Priuii?) has given the company an unparalleled technical advantage. It is also ploughing money into hydrogen fuel cell technology, compact electric city cars, robotics and even flying cars.

But the Land Cruiser is about building for the future in a very different way, a car designed to survive and soldier on, outliving obsolescence and relentless updates. It is the kind of car that sits around on a country estate like an old retainer, bought new but lasting out the generations. These are rare qualities in modern industrial design and as such should be celebrated.

INFORMATION

Toyota Land Cruiser, from £52,855. For more information, visit the Toyata website

The bi-annual Tokyo Motor Show is a perfect snapshot of the auto industry’s ever-closer relationship to technology. The big three shifts coming down the road are EVs, autonomous driving and connected cars, and it was the latter theme that underpinned this, the 45th Tokyo show. Although usurped by start-ups in China and the US in recent years, the Japanese industry can still lay claim to being the world’s most sophisticated, both in terms of manufacturing superiority and a welcoming attitude towards technology that speeds up innovation and adoption.

The show’s strapline was ‘Beyond the Motor’, and the emphasis was very much on how cars are used and configured and not how they were actually powered; EVs and hybrids are pretty much taken for granted at this point, but connectivity is the final piece in the jigsaw. A futuristic set of interactive displays used video game tech to illustrate the connected future, turning the car from an individual space into a social one, as well as pooling the information gathered by traffic and feeding it back into your individual demands. For example, feedback from cars already stuck in city centre traffic would be sent back to drivers setting out from the suburbs and give them a chance to re-route or even re-consider their journey.

The big car makers showed a huge variety of concepts, from single-person transporters to sleek traditional saloons and cars that docked with private homes, all reinforcing the message that mobility is a holistic, all-encompassing state of mind, and not just about traditional family car ownership. VR presentations were ubiquitous, with simulations offering up ways to experience autonomous driving, information presentation, even facial recognition systems that detected whether a driver was alert or falling asleep at the wheel. The industry’s myriad suppliers were out in force, beavering away turning the prosaic bits of cars into signposts to the future, from lights to seats to in-car entertainment. The occasional quirky outlier – Yamaha’s bike-riding Motorbot, Takayama Cars’ bizarre telescopic mobile kitchen car – add richness to the stew. Here’s our pick of the best of Tokyo Motor Show.

Mazda: Mazda’s Tokyo display was slightly different from its peers, in that the emphasis was on beauty and emotion, not the nuts and bolts of the technology underneath. The company has been ploughing a lonely furrow with this approach in recent years, but all signs point to it paying off; even the lowliest Mazda has a design pizzaz that’s almost utterly absent in its rivals. The company consolidated its grip on ‘elegant’ design – the so-called ‘Kodo’ approach – with the Vision Coupe (pictured), a big, handsome four-door coupe that was lavishly finished and finely detailed, even it wasn’t entirely on brand. Mazda also showed the more credible Kai concept, a beautifully detailed vision of tomorrow’s city car that emphasised the sculptural over the cute. Elsewhere, the company was pushing its new collaboration with Shiseido, the venerable Japanese perfume brand, reasoning that scent was one of the last sensual bastions not conquered by car makers.

Nissan: It’s all about electric mobility for Nissan, currently at the forefront of the company’s EV industry thanks to its long-term investment and experienced garnered with the original Leaf, one of the world’s best-selling electric cars. Leaf Mk2 is now on sale – the company showed a Nismo performance version at Tokyo – but the big news was a new concept, the IMx, yet another crossover concept but one which boasts a range of around 600km, as well as a speculative ProPILOT autonomous system and the capacity to shuffle around the interior to make a more social space – a common theme.

Toyota: This was a big show for Toyota, which has seen its traditional market dominance gradually nibbled away over recent years. Despite being a hybrid pioneer, it was slow to embrace the pure EV and continues to invest heavily in hydrogen, a technology the jury has yet to pass a verdict on. As well as announcing the Drive to Go concept store – aimed at getting young people into car-sharing without committing to buy – the company ran the gamut, from the properly futuristic Concept-i (pictured) and its companion, the Concept-i RIDE, through to the shark-nosed HV sport – a clear play for the heart-strings of the Western driving enthusiast to the ultra-boxy but well-conceived FJ Concept and the incredibly but majestically old-fashioned Century, ‘Japan’s Rolls-Royce’, out of time in terms of style and approach but massively charming nonetheless.

Honda: As part of the Tokyo Connected Lab display, Honda showed a cartoonish but not incredible depiction of tomorrow’s connected suburban home, complete with boxy, dockable people carrier, the le-Mobi, which doubles up as extra living space and a Pixar-like home robot/lawnmower, the Ai-Miimo Concept, pottering about the front yard, picking up parcels and chatting with the neighbours, as well as a myriad number of mobility devices that play to the country’s ageing demographic. On its main stand, Honda showed everything from 1950s style mopeds to the high-tech NSX supercar. Star of the show, however, was the Sports EV Concept (pictured), a companion to the Newson-esque City EV concept, all soft curves and beautifully minimal high-tech interior.

Daihatsu: Not to be outdone, Toyota’s small car subsidiary Daihatsu showed the DN Compagno (pictured), a delightful mini-scale four-door coupe with clear hints of Italian coachbuilding. Japanese retro-modernism at its desirable best. The company also had the DN U Space, a box on wheels, pushing the idea as the car as little more than white goods.

Suzuki: Mobility means many things, and Suzuki showed a proper mobility scooter in amongst its cute mini SUVs, notably the bulbous x-Bee, which continued the country’s tradition of aesthetically similar Tall Vans, offered by almost every manufacturer to squeeze into laws governing certain maximum vehicle sizes. Suzuki also had the e-Survivor (pictured), a push me-pull you styled futuristic small off-roader.

Lexus: Perhaps overshadowed by parent group Toyota’s wide range of cutting-edge concepts, Lexus had a relatively low-key show. Its LS+ Concept previewed the next generation of the company’s mid-range luxury car, complete with comprehensive autonomous driving skills and styling that extended the signature ‘spindle’ grille into a kind of fishnet-style wrapping across the front of the car.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Tokyo Motor Show website

This year's Salone del Mobile saw a bevy of car brands catch the design bug. Here's our edit of the best.



Setsuna by Toyota: This wooden roadster concept explores the value of a car beyond mere driving. The functioning roadster is conceptualised to explore our relationship with our vehicles, our memories, history and the physical ageing process.



The Setsuna is constructed using 86 handmade wooden panels chosen according to weight, durability and stiffness, and assembled using the traditional Japanese wood joinery method of okuri ari

Car companies are increasingly finding their way to Milan in a bid to absorb the creative spirit of Salone del Mobile; it makes sense to be involved in the wider design world given the car’s ongoing evolution from a vehicle for transport to a multi-functioning product and advanced tech gadget.



This year, Toyota presented an unusual study car as part of Fuorisalone, away from the main trade show in the vibrant Tortona design district. The Setsuna is made of wood, and at first glance it could easily be mistaken for a toy car. Yet this is a fully functioning roadster replete with an engine conceptualised to explore our relationship with our cars, our memories, history and the physical ageing process.



Meanwhile, sister company Lexus took over a former metal factory to exhibit 'Anticipation' with Formafantasma. Here the Italian design studio based its study on the Lexus LF-FC, first seen at last year’s Tokyo Motor Show, to create a curious trio of installations that explore the fusion of machine, craft and tradition in the context of this hydrogen powered fuel-cell car.



The Japanese marque also exhibited its Lexus Design Awards, an ambitious annual project to support emerging international talent. Among the 12 finalists chosen from over a thousand entries were some interesting and unusual propositions. They included packaging material made from seaweed, an instinctive children’s toy set, modular clothing and a clock that visualises the present by marking the passing of time.



Also in Tortona, 'Mini Living' explored urban life, with some simple yet intriguing ideas on affordable compact housing for a utopian future. The concept saw four 30 sq m apartments share a residential building to form a micro-neighbourhood where basic assets are shared through a clever wall mechanism of rotating shelves that are pushed out into a communal space.



Elsewhere, 'Cactus Chair' by Italian designer Mario Bellini utilises Airbump, the intelligent protective side shield mounted on the Citroën C4 Cactus, for a lightweight and comfortable seating product.



Land Rover and industrial designer Odo Fioravanti created an installation featuring a surfboard, snowboard and longboard to celebrate the freedom of movement offered by the latest Evoque Convertible SUV, whilst Aston Martin joined forces with Quintessence Yachts to celebrate the imminent launch of its first luxury powerboat, the AM37.



See above for our pick of the most inspiring car-related products in Milan above...

Japanese cedar makes up the exterior, chosen for the refinement of its wood grain and its flexibility; the chassis is made of birch; strong Japanese zelkova constitutes the floor; and the seats are made of smooth Castor-aralia.



The idea is that the material will change colour and texture with time, showing the evolution of the vehicle and thus adding emotional value to the car. The Setsuna has ecological benefits too, since the modular panels can be exchanged when needed, rather than having to replace the whole body.



Meaning ‘moment’ in Japanese, the Setsuna is a romantic study of the car as a living, breathing object that matures, not just visually but spiritually absorbing the aspirations, memories and emotions of its various owners

Lexus x Formafantasma's 'Anticipation': Lexus took over a former metal factory to exhibit a trio of installations by the Italian design duo Formafantasma. Working to the overall theme of ‘anticipation’, the Amsterdam-based studio explores the fusion of machine, craft and tradition. The Lexus LF-FC fuel cell vehicle is the muse here, investigating the possibilities of the lightweight material and sustainable hydrogen energy outside the context of motoring.



For the overall structure, Formafantasma has installed translucent partitions inspired by Japanese shoji – the paper walls and doors are fixed over a lattice frame of wood to allow light to pass through and reveal shadows and shapes in a theatrical way

Visitors enter through a ‘garden’ of multiple wooden gates revealing a series of exhibition areas. The first features a set of metal stools painted, like the LF-FC, using traditional Japanese lacquering techniques that involve layering colours by hand and machine.



In the second room a large metal frame holds 7,200 delicate flowing transparent threads; an homage to early Japanese mechanised textile making, Formafantasma explains. Here a loom-like machine pulls and releases the threads that, once stretched, subtly reveal the three-dimensional outline of the LF-FC vehicle.



In the third and largest space Formafantasma celebrates the advanced hydrogen fuel cell technology in the LF-FC, used here to power a kinetic light installation. The four semi-circular stainless steel sculptures, mounted on a reflective pink platform that hides the power source, move to a choreographed slow dance.



To complete the sense of anticipation, Formafantasma worked closely with Michelin-starred chef Yoji Tokuyoshi, of Milan's Ristorante Tokuyoshi, for a range of surprising tasting experiences (pictured) centred on clear water emitted by the LF-FC hydrogen fuel cell technology as an expression of its sustainable qualities

DADA by Myungsik Jan, for Lexus Design Awards: DADA is inspired by the Korean ceremony doljabi, when on a first birthday a range of objects are placed in front of the child. What they choose is said to reveal their career. This modern rendition uses a range of natural blocks, cylinders and fabrics to pique the child’s curiosity and predict their future path

AM37 by Aston Martin and Quintessence Yachts: The AM37 is a joint project between Aston Martin and Quintessence Yachts, and the car marque’s first venture into nautical design. The name suggests its size; this 37-foot water vessel utilises carbon-fibre in its construction with a clever vacuum infusion technology to build a scalpel-sharp hull that is at the centre of its design.



The marque is promising further advances, such as interactive voice control and activation, a fully HD-integrated touch screen with navigation and multimedia system and remote control functions. The boat is expected to launch later this year

'FreeRide' by Odo Fioravanti, for Land Rover: Industrial designer Odo Fioravanti has worked with Land Rover to create 'FreeRide', an installation featuring a surfboard, snowboard and longboard to celebrate the freedom of movement offered by the latest Evoque Convertible SUV

'Cactus Chair' by Mario Bellini, for Citroën: The 'Cactus Chair' by Italian designer Mario Bellini utilises Airbump, the intelligent protective side shield mounted on the Citroën C4 Cactus, for a lightweight and comfortable seating product.



The supple TPU (thermo-plastic urethane) skin on the Airbump, with its multitude of air capsules, requires no particular maintenance and is designed to protect the car’s bodywork against knocks and scratches. Bellini’s design utilises similar technology to create a lightweight construction that offers the same levels of comfort as a traditional chair

'Shape Shifters' by Angelëne, for Lexus Design Awards: This is a new form of textile cutting for adaptable clothing to promote personalisation and reduce consumption and waste. With an MA in material futures from Central Saint Martins, studio founder Angelene Laura Fenuta looks at how modular principles can help create dynamic garments with embedded silhouette versatility

'Plants-Skin' by Hiroto Yoshizoe, for Lexus Design Awards: This intelligent, moderately permeable flowerpot is made from coloured mortar coated with hydro-chromic ink. When the surface absorbs water the white ink becomes transparent and colour appears, the gradation revealing the level of moisture, so as to indicate when the plant requires feeding

'Mini Living' by Mini, ON and Arup: 'Mini Living' explores new models for urban existence in the form of a modern shared-living concept. This inspired idea sees four 30 sq m apartments on a single floor of a residential building form a micro-neighbourhood with basic assets – kitchen, laundry, utilities – shared through a simple wall concept of folding and rotating shelves that are pushed out into communal spaces.



Here, Mini worked with Yokohama architects ON Design for their expertise in micro-housing and collaborative living, whilst the Berlin office of engineering consultant Arup provided technical support.



'Mini Living' visualises likeminded people residing almost communally without sacrificing privacy in an affordable and rather attractive housing project

'Trace' by Studio Ayaskan, for Lexus Design Awards: The clock visualises the present by marking the passing of time through a liquid that changes colour under ultra-violet rays. Conceptualised by the London-based, Turkish studio Ayaskan, a UV light beam rotates around the face of the clock to mark every second, minute and hour, leaving a trace of colour as time sweeps by, then fading back to transparency

'Agar Plasticity' by AMAM, for Lexus Design Awards: Winner of the Lexus Design Awards, the Japanese studio AMAM worked with Max Lamb as a mentor, to explore sustainable packaging using a gelatinous material made from red marine algae. The flexibility of the material means that it can be used for both cushioning and packaging; it can be ecologically disposed of and won’t harm marine line if it should drift into the sea

INFORMATION

For more information, see our Salone del Mobile live report

You can’t beat the Tokyo Motorshow for concept cars. Every two years the best Japanese car (and motorbike) manufacturers, plus a sprinkling of European and US brands, come up with new and thoughtful ideas for going faster (and slower, but more interestingly). Many of the designs are informed by a focus on small and well-packaged cars with eco powertrains suited to the city, and that look as good static as when moving. They are also underpinned by technologies often closer to production than the futuristic concepts that house them might indicate.

The 44th edition was one of the best of Tokyo Motorshows for years, perhaps reflecting a more optimistic economic outlook and better organisation and timing – moving to an earlier date in the calendar, rather than November – when it often overlapped directly with the LA Auto Show.

Concept highlights included a Honda stand-up commuter vehicle resembling a stormtrooper helmet, a Nissan boxcar with a virtually-virtual interior and a Toyota fuel cell vehicle that doubles up as a portable energy generator. Production cars were also unveiled at the show – Mini’s new convertible and a few BMW and Porsche go-faster variants – but Tokyo’s emphasis is firmly on the conceptual, thus our emphasis here.

See above for the Top Ten Tokyo 2015 Motorshow concepts, as curated by Wallpaper*... 

INFORMATION
For more information, visit Tokyo Motorshow’s website

In recent years Toyota has experienced some less than favourable media coverage. But, with the accelerator pedal dramas of 2010 well behind it, the Japanese motoring titan has once again re-established itself as the world's leading car manufacturer. Aware of competitors keen to usurp market authority, Toyota's R+D wizards have long been burning the midnight oil to bring something refreshingly fun to the industry's attention.
 
Back in 2009, the company showed the FT-86 concept, a front-engined rear-wheel drive compact four-seater sports coupé that promised to fulfil our basest motoring desires. It's taken a few years for a production car to emerge, but those early expectations appear to have been justified. The renamed Toyota GT-86, recently experienced by Wallpaper* on the mountain switchbacks above Barcelona was, by-and-large, as entertaining as the hype.
 
Contorting yourself into the driver's seat, you're reminded of 911s from years gone by, with just enough room to get comfortable without ever forgetting you're in a low-slung sports car. On the move, everything comes together. Despite its size, the normally aspirated 2-litre boxer engine works tirelessly, producing best results when pushed to its higher rev range. In the corners, a combination of low ride height, firm suspension, even weight distribution and quality rubber gives you abundant levels of grip.
 
Toyota's engineers - all keen motorsports enthusiasts - decided to exploit the chassis potential by fitting (as standard) the same narrow tyre found on the hybrid Prius, a gutsy decision given its sporting brief and surprisingly one that works for all intents and purposes. So convinced is the company of the car's potential that it offered it up on closed circuit conditions, allowing W* to experience the GT-86 in is its natural environment (where, incidentally, it remained on its Prius road tyres).
 
On the track, the sports coupé really made sense. With its light, nimble handling more direct than on the road, and one of the least obtrusive traction control systems in memory, the Toyota GT-86 could be driven as intended in these surroundings, and how very enjoyable the experience played out to be. This is a sports car for the masses, a machine in which enjoyment is paramount. From the earliest design sketches to the first models rolling out of the production hall, every measure has been focused on driver pleasure.
 
For a company churning huge numbers of day-to-day saloons and hatchbacks, Toyota has desperately needed to inject excitement back into a garden-variety portfolio and, with a driver oriented offering such as this, it has achieved just that.   
 
Despite early industry acceptance, Toyota can't bathe in the 86's success as entirely its own doing. To develop and produce the car, Toyota formed an alliance with fellow Japanese manufacturers, Subaru, who played an instrumental role in the engineering, while also imparting their expertise in connection to the boxer engine, the power train at the heart of the coupé. On the flipside, Subaru's own version of the car, the BRZ, is able to benefit from Toyota's initial product planning and design phases.
 
As it stands, Toyota has managed to bring the GT-86 to market slightly ahead of Subaru's BRZ, which is available later this summer.

It's safe to say that despite its status as the world's largest car manufacturer, Toyota has experienced something of a turbulent 2010. With 1.8 million units recalled across Europe due to heavily publicised issues with accelerator pedals on a range of models produced since 2007, not to mention claims of electronic gremlins lurking within the hybrid poster child, the Prius, the Tokyo-based giant now has some ground to claw back. All this against a backdrop of global economic downturn and a generally depressed market.

Unsurprisingly, it's very much business as usual. Wallpaper* recently sampled the 2010 Land Cruiser, the latest iteration of a machine with some six decades of history and a good claim to being one of the world's most reliable cars.

The trusty old Land Cruiser is also the world's best selling 4WD vehicle - some five million have been sold in 188 countries around the world. Initially developed for military use back in the 1950s, the modern LC has established itself as the premier SUV in terms of quality, durability and refinement. The original models are still much prized (California-based ICON 4x4 remain committed to updating the original iconic LC models, for example), but the fifth generation shows quite how far the concept has come.

The Land Cruiser will always be a tough, go anywhere off-roader, although now there are some clever technological advances to help aid driver ability and enhance life on board. For example, exterior cameras feature heavily, affording the driver a comprehensive view of the area immediately next to the vehicle otherwise obscured from sight - incredibly helpful when tackling narrow passes or heavily bouldered terrain.

In addition to front and rear cameras, the system features left and right door mirror-mounted cameras capable of projecting either a front or a rear side view, with ultra-wide angle lenses to show the broadest possible forward vista.

Toyota has decided against drastically developing the Land Cruiser's exterior but a subtle injection of aggression is evident through increasingly flared wheel arches. A beefed up front bumper also allows enough visual impact without the loss of those iconically boxy characteristics. The new LC also sits precisely on its predecessor's wheelbase, partly so as not to reduce its off-road maneuverability.

Go-anywhere ability is essential. Now that many of its rivals straddle the worlds of town and country with increasing ease, the LC technical team has introduced a Kinetic Dynamic Suspension System' (KDSS), which helps soak up the body roll and bumps on conventional road surfaces, making the steering rather snappier into the bargain.

However, it's off road where the LC really comes into its own. Tasked with guiding 2.5 tonnes of car across any surface you chose to tackle, the LC is utterly unfazed. We sampled a wide range of terrains around Corsica and came away impressed: when faced with a perpendicular ravine composed of greasy unforgiving slate and flanked by beautiful yet treacherous rocks, one may be absolved from experiencing a heightened sense of trepidation. In the Land Cruiser, cabin panic is not a problem. The 'Active Traction Control' manipulates brakes and engine to distribute torque around all four wheels as needed, thanks to a cunning array of sensors.

We were also very taken by the 'Crawl Control' mechanism, a little piece of automation that's capable of transforming even the novice off-roader into a Dakar dynamo at the flick of a switch. Engage the Crawl Control system and the onboard computer will assist your slow ascent/descent of slopes at walking pace, without the need to even touch the pedals: just select one of five speed settings and then concentrate on steering. The LC is also equipped to wade through deep water at a slow, steady pace, helping prevent a risk of engine flooding or sustaining damage from submerged objects.

Spend any time with 2010 Land Cruiser and its cross-terrain capabilities are never in doubt, whether you're travelling to a suburban B&Q or to the foothills of Kilimanjaro. Many years of considered development have clearly paid off. However, others aren't far behind. Land Rover has mastered the art of making luxury cars that will literally stop at nothing. But application is everything; you're unlikely to see a fleet of Range Rovers pitch up to a UN mission in Central Africa. As long as Toyota refuses to compromise the Land Cruiser's off-road ability, and retains the bloody-minded bluntness of its visual approach, its reputation will be secure.

The cultural history of the Toyota Prius is an object lesson in how to soften up consumers and get new tech into the marketplace.

Easily the most famous hybrid car in the world, a position attained by the twin prong strategy of being first and being persistent, the Prius is now in its third incarnation.

On sale in Europe from Autumn 2009, Prius Mk3 builds upon the buzz of the first two cars, enhancing the efficiency of Toyota's hybrid drive system and generally fleshing out the look and feel so that – to all intents and purposes – the Prius acts no differently from a conventional car.

See more of the third incarnation of the Toyoto Prius, easily the most famous hybrid car in the world

This last point is crucial. While the first Prius of 1997 was visually bland it garnered attention thanks to the high-profile list of celebrity owners. By the time the second generation car broke cover in 2004, the company had coaxed its design team into slightly more self-expression, in the process creating the 'hybrid style' most recently aped by the Honda Insight. Prius III is more of the same, bulbous rather than sleek, but with a faint echo of old-school American futurism in its swooping lines and large lamp glasses. It's as if we're getting very late deliveries of a future promised a half century ago.

Features

Inside, the cabin is airy, although fixtures and fittings are lightweight (the doors shut with a metallic 'sproing' that implies cost, rather than weight, efficiencies). The dashboard is far less confusing than the earlier cars, condensing the complex inner workings of the car into an easy-to-read display. In a nutshell, the Prius’s Hybrid Synergy Drive has a petrol engine supported by a bank of batteries, which are charged through kinetic energy generated by braking. At rest, the engine switches off altogether, and the latest model also offers an 'EV' mode that allows the car to coast along on electric power alone, albeit at limited speeds and very limited range. While keener Prius prodders managed to hack second-generation cars to perform a similar function, the superior hybrid tech and better batteries in the new car make this eerily quiet electric mode a genuinely futuristic experience.

Fuel efficiency

The real-world advantages of ultra fuel efficiency are plain to see; it's easy to understand why people become 'hypermilers', that subset of West Coast hybrid geeks who devote their time to extracting every last inch from each drop of gasoline. For this is a machine that rewards smoothness and deliberate, methodical driving. There's something supremely satisfying about ramping up the high mileage stats; equally, you can understand why the car's detractors accuse Prius drivers of being smug.

Conclusion

It's also important to note that this mid-size car isn't exactly a nippy city machine: it's not an urban car, but a suburban one. Perhaps in American terms - the Prius's largest market - it feels small, but in densely packed Europe the car offers no real advantages in terms of parking or manoeuvrability. Ultimately, however, none of this matters. The Prius is an utterly practical, discretely designed and easy-to-use machine, one that delivers some of the very lowest CO2 figures on the market, as well as all-important exemption from London's congestion charge. The Prius continues to push gently at our perceptions of what an everyday car should be, implying that the ongoing revolution in automotive technology will be a velvet one.

Toyota chose to launch their diminutive iQ city car amongst the glowing shop windows of a wintry Milan. From the initial pick-up at the Villa Malpensa, that perennial launch-pad for press events, rising up incongruously from the flat industrial landscape surrounding the airport, the test route was carefully calibrated to take in both the open autostrada and the cramped cobbled streets of central Milan.

see more images of the IQ as it tackles the Italian streets

In truth, the iQ isn't exactly news, First launched as a concept at the 2007 Frankfurt Auto Show, the design only required minor fettling before it became a production-ready car. Styled at Toyota's French design studio, the iQ is not much of a looker. With its filleted edges and deep scoops, the bodywork looks as if it's been chiseled out of a far larger car. This is where the design dollars have been spent, compacting and rearranging the mechanical underpinnings in order to cram four people into a vehicle that's barely longer than a Smart car.

Once inside the iQ, the perception shifting continues. For a start, the high driving position gives the impression of a far larger machine - you certainly don't feel subservient to almost every road user (at least not in Italy, where common sense continues to prevail when it comes to the size of the average urban automobile). Although we were driving a pre-production model, to all intents and purposes the car resembled the machine you can expect to drive out of European showrooms in January 2009. American readers will have to wait - the iQ might not appear in the land of the supersized automobile for several years.

As we headed north for the lakes, past the region's endless sprawl of light industry and eccentric roadside architecture, the iQ handled the fast-moving autostrada with aplomb. However, despite the snowy, sun-drenched Alps ahead, the open road wasn't really of interest. This is a car that's just three metres long; the city is where it belongs. With that in mind, we were directed into the heart of Milan for a taste of the rush hour. Small and nippy enough to dart into the rare gaps in traffic, our pristine white iQ example was as yet unmarked by the scars of close contact daily commuting, and we suspected that Toyota wanted it to remain that way.

The slippery combination of cobbles and tramlines conspire to make the city's streets a testing place for a small car, but the iQ coped with ease (although go for the manual, rather than the rather hesitant automatic transmission). After a coffee stop at the Park Hyatt on Via Silvio Pellico - helpfully within a couple of car lengths of the freshly-scrubbed Duomo - we were treated to a circuitous route through the shopping district to show off the car's impressive maneuverability (plus the iQ's ability to turn the heads of the city's more discerning individuals).

That evening, the formal press conference attempted to give us a clear picture of the iQ. The car is the result of five years of engineering effort, which, for the benefit of our short attention spans, had been distilled into a series of easy-to-swallow technical factoids. In essence, all you need to know is this; Toyota's engineers have made the iQ's oily bits smaller, leaving more space for human beings. The engineering dispensed with, our hosts moved on to design. The iQ's launch colours are white, black and purple, with soft, CGI-esque shadows giving the car a certain video game slickness. The press briefing stressed the car's apparent fusion of traditional Japanese design cues ('J-factor') and contemporary technology, but this is par for the course these days. Even the apparent use of some fancy mathematical equations to create the car's complex bodywork felt like an attempt to blind us with advanced aesthetics.

Nonetheless, as a piece of design the iQ is far more coherent than, say, a Fiat 500 or a MINI, if only because it hasn't been burdened by stylistic spectres from the past. As a result it's not nearly as cute as its peers. Instead, it is functional rather than flippant. Perversely, despite all the slick 21st century-isms, the optional satnav system has been designed to squat atop the dashboard like a piece of lurid 1980s hi-fi equipment or an obscure brand of games console. This is the kind of J-factor we can enthusiastically endorse.

Yet rather than let nature take its course and sit back and wait as the world's cities embraced this miracle of automotive packaging, Toyota still feels the need to spell everything out in giant sized letters. Milan had apparently been chosen for its status as 'one of the world's fashion and style capitals'. With the press entourage holed up in Matteo Thun's Nhow Hotel in Via Tortona, the emphasis was on Design with a capital D, that mysterious commodity that still seems to be in such demand.

Just as a 'design hotel' distills certain preconceived ideas about modern design down into a series of easily digestible visuals, so the evening's press presentation laboured the point that the iQ was pitched at the modern, design-conscious city dweller. This, we were told, is a car that will 'build affinity amongst younger, urban populations'. After a blizzard of city-focused statistics we were taken through the iQ's European marketing strategy, ranging from displays aimed at German interior design aficionados to a collaboration with the RCA's product design students. All well and good, but bizarrely the company believes the car's core buyers are, and we quote, 'responsible socialites' and 'New Yuppies'. This is information we would have chosen to keep under our hats, for no-one likes a pigeonholing, however well intentioned.

So will people ditch their X5 for an iQ? We see no reason why not. If you can ignore the marketing hype - which implies the car has been built to tick boxes and not push envelopes - the car is a delight, with almost everyone you need placed into an ultra-efficient package. It's about time that elements of Japan's Kei car culture started filtering through to the West, and the iQ is a great way to kick off the small-scale revolution. Although we wouldn't want to embrace every other aspect of New Yuppiedom, the iQ at least makes exceptional sense.