Barcelona in early summer is not a bad place to put a new car through its paces. The city's grid of wide boulevards and tight Gothic Quarter streets makes for a useful test of any car's urban abilities – and then the motorway north allows for a foot-to-the-floor thrill. Volvo chose the location deliberately. The EX60, its new all-electric mid-size SUV, deserved a dynamic test ground to put its ambitions to the test.

Those ambitions are pretty considerable. The EX60 enters the industry's most fiercely contested segment, where the BMW iX3, Audi Q6 e-tron, Tesla Model Y, and Mercedes GLC Electric are already established cars.

Also, it carries the weight of an illustrious predecessor: the XC60, which in July 2025 surpassed 2.7 million sales to overtake even the beloved, iconically boxy 240 as the brand's best-selling car of all time. Designed predominantly for what Volvo calls the ‘progressive modern family’, it has to be ‘a car for all’. That is a considerable pair of shoes to fill.

This new EX60 design is the first car from Volvo’s third-generation Scalable Platform Architecture (SPA3). It includes mega-casted aluminium and cell-to-body manufacturing, next-generation e-motors, and unified software and hardware technology – Volvo says the EX60 has the lowest carbon footprint and the highest amount (27 per cent) of recycled content of any Volvo car to date.

Visually, Volvo has focused on curating an aerodynamic design. A drag coefficient of 0.26 makes this a genuine claim, rather than just a gesture. There is no intimidating front grille; in its place, a cleaner, more discerning face. The new haptic wing-grip door handles dissolve into the side profile, complemented by frameless doors, flush glazing, and the high-definition pixel ‘Thor's Hammer’ headlights. This latest iteration of Volvo’s tall vertical taillights is also a nice touch – reminiscent of the 1990s V70 design. Certainly, at first glance, the EX60 is a sleek-looking machine.

Volvo has utilised mega-casting and cell-to-body construction, the former to create a huge single-piece aluminium rear floor with battery cells integrated directly into the structure itself. The practical upshot is a lower, flatter floor and more usable interior space, alongside improvements in rigidity and impact protection.

Three battery options are available. The entry-level P6 – single motor, rear-wheel drive – offers 374hp and a projected range of up to 379 miles; a convincing case for most buyers. Our test car was the mid-spec P10 AWD, with 510hp and 0-60 in 4.4 seconds, and it felt every bit of it out on the motorway.

At the top of the range, the P12 AWD pushes to 680hp, dispatches 0-60 in 3.8 seconds, and still covers up to 503 miles on a charge. Across all three, 800V technology means a 10-80 per cent charge takes as little as 16 minutes. In practice, this means ‘range anxiety’ begins to feel like a thing of the past.

In terms of ride and handling, the chassis has been tuned to feel more dynamic than the larger Volvo EX90 – and it’s a decision that pays off. The standard Advanced Chassis includes Frequency Selective Damping, which reads the road mechanically and adjusts accordingly. Step up to the optional Active Chassis, available on the P10 AWD and P12 AWD, and the system monitors the car, the road, and the driver up to 500 times per second.

Alongside the car’s built-in HuginCore system (named for a bird in Norse mythology), there’s also Google Gemini with conversational AI, which means you can talk to your car naturally. For example, it can respond to requests for beauty spots to stop off at en route.

The urban leg of the drive felt reassuringly effortless. The car's suite of driver assistance systems – which includes five cameras, five radars and 12 ultrasonic sensors to give a 360-degree real-time view of the surroundings – takes the edge off city navigation. Out on the motorway, you can feel the powertrain options come into play. We put our foot down in our P10 AWD, and it certainly didn’t feel slow.

Inside, the cabin is where Volvo's Scandinavian restraint really translates. Sara Erichsen Susnjar, senior colour & material design manager at Volvo, says, ‘We wanted to create a calm, comfortable environment that instills a sense of control while also making you feel cared for. Each element is thoughtfully designed to serve either a functional or aesthetic role.’ It is calm, considered, and free of the gratuitous surface complexity that afflicts many of its rivals – a cocoon rather than a cockpit.

The UK gets two trim levels at launch – Plus and Ultra. Plus is no spartan entry point; alongside the exterior 20-inch, five-spoke matt/diamond-cut alloys and Matrix LED headlights, the interior comes with heated front and rear seats, three-zone climate control, a Bose premium sound system, and a panoramic glass roof. It sets a luxury tone from the outset.

The higher spec Ultra trim, which served as our test car, came with 21-inch, five-spoke graphite diamond-cut alloys (you can ‘supersize’ this further with the 22-inch, Y-spoke matt black option), high-definition pixel headlights, a Bowers & Wilkins high fidelity audio system, an Electrochromic roof, and the optional ventilated Nappa leather seats. Safety, as ever with Volvo, is non-negotiable: Volvo’s newly developed Multi-adaptive front safety belts, the HuginCore platform, and the Advanced Sensing Technology system are fitted as standard across the range.

One detail to note: Volvo plans on releasing the EX60 Cross Country variant mid-next year, and we caught a glimpse of the prototype model on the trip. Built on the same electric foundation as the EX60, the EX60 Cross Country has a slightly hiked stance – 20mm as standard, but using the standard air suspension's off-road mode, you can gain another 20mm, so 40mm total – and adaptive air suspension that fine-tunes height and damping for comfort and stability. The example we laid eyes on had a very appealing Ventilated Midnight Blue Tailored Knit interior option – exclusive on the Cross Country model. We’d be tempted to wait a few more months for this one.

What’s the verdict? Ultimately, what the EX60 delivers is coherence. It is as capable of a brisk motorway overtake as it is of wafting more glacially to the school gates – and it does both without the identity crisis that afflicts some of its more performance-focused rivals. Whether it can match the XC60's extraordinary commercial legacy remains to be seen. On the evidence we gathered and experienced, it has every right to try.

Volvo EX60, from £56,860, Volvocars.com, @VolvocarUK

One of the golden rules of restomodding is that you start with an acknowledged classic, rather than try and transform a historic also-ran into a contemporary machine (there are, of course, exceptions). That’s certainly the case with Autoforma’s take on the Volvo P1800 ES, the Norrsken, revealed here in sketch and render form, alongside a pristine example of the original.

Autoforma isn’t the first company to offer a new take on the evergreen P1800, a lightly sporting two-door design that Volvo manufactured from 1961 to 1973. The car’s distinctive shape was penned by Pelle Petterson, overseen by the legendary Pietro Frua (then working for Carrozzeria Ghia), and the blend of Swedish function and Italian flair has never gone out of fashion.

A P1800 holds the world record for the highest ever recorded mileage, with a 1966 example travelling three million miles to date. Around one sixth of the total production was given over to the P1800ES model, a shooting brake-style mini estate introduced towards the end of the car’s run in 1972.

The 1800ES will form the basis of Autoforma’s new machine. The company is a spin-off venture from Niels van Roij Design, recently seen here with its remarkable transformation of a 1981 Rolls-Royce Corniche into a unique shooting brake. Autoforma will follow a similar path but focus on (very limited) series production, rather than one-offs.

‘For us, the P1800ES is not simply “a great looking car.” It is an archetype of the Volvo body language at its most refined: intelligent, human centred, and (especially at the time of its conception) quietly progressive,’ van Roij told Wallpaper*, ‘Reinterpreting it allows us to explore the best of both worlds: heritage and modernity, usability and emotion through a deeply considered car design process.’

From the name Norrsken (‘northern lights’) to the three proposed design packages, the restomod is a celebration of all things Swedish. Autoforma describes the project as a ‘new interpretations of a Scandinavian design icon – from faithful tradition to bold contemporary expression – all rooted in restraint, craftsmanship, and everyday usability.’ As is common in the restomod community, every car will be built to a unique customer specification.

Under the skin, there are a host of upgrades. For a start, the Norrsken will have a tuned Volvo T5 five-cylinder engine, one of the marque’s great ICE powerplants, complete with new exhaust for sonorous performance. Other upgrades including new brakes, revised suspension, quicker steering and an upgraded transmission.

The Norrsken makes its debut with three bespoke liveries, the traditional ‘Heritage Heaven’ specification; the modern Scandi-inspired ‘Modern Marvel’ and ‘Forward Fashionista’, which emphasises the upgraded performance. Van Roij describes this as ‘the most expressive interpretation of Norrsken. Introduced as the launch specification, it pushes contemporary design and performance further – while remaining true to the essence of the P1800 ES.’

Stylistically, it’s as if the original P1800ES has been given an under the counter course of anabolic steroids, with a lowered ride height, new front grille and LED lights, a slightly more discrete use of chrome and – most notably of all – a widened stance with wheels cloaked in new carbon fibre wheelarches. Autoforma certainly hasn’t forgotten the practicalities – this is an estate car after all – with a roof rack on the options list.

Inside, the basic character of the original P1800ES dashboard remains intact, only every surface is enhanced with more tactile premium materials, including aluminium, wood veneer, Alcantara and Scandinavian wool blends. New seats and centre console add more support and practicality, while the luggage compartment can be upgraded with leather luggage straps and even your own bespoke set of cases.

‘The Volvo P1800ES resonates with us because it represents one of the purest expressions of the elegant shooting brake archetype,’ says van Roij, ‘At Niels van Roij Design, mother company of Autoforma, shooting brakes a key part of the typical coachbuilding conversions we do. They combine dynamism with utility, sculpture with purpose. The P1800ES embodies that duality perfectly.’

‘In the specific case of the 1800ES, its glass tail, long roofline and restrained surfacing create an architectural clarity that feels both rational and romantic,’ the designer continues, ‘It is unmistakably Volvo, honest, relatively upright, simple, yet at the same time sleek and almost delicate in proportion. That tension is incredibly compelling from a car designer’s perspective too.’

There is a precedent for the Norrsken. Back in 2020, Cyan Racing revealed the P1800 Cyan, a radically tuned, ultra-light performance version of the coupe model. Autoforma reckons it’ll produce around five Norrskens a year, with donor vehicles sourced from Dutch classic specialists Volvo Lotte. The price? The top-of-the-line Forward Fashionista specification will start from around €300,000, plus tax.

Autoforma.nl, NielsvanRoij.com, @NielsvanRoijDesign

Volvo will celebrate its centennial in 2027 and the company is already starting to ramp up the celebrations. Last year saw the opening of the World of Volvo in Gothenburg, a vast circular timber structure designed by Scandinavian design specialists Henning Larsen.

2026 will see another significant design upheaval, albeit on a much smaller and less obvious scale. The arrival of a new brand typeface, Volvo Centum, manages to combine the company’s obvious love of modernist design with its obsessive pursuit of safety.

The work of London-based type design studio Dalton Maag, the new typeface is designed ‘to improve readability, sharpen attention, and promote a calmer, safety-focused driving experience.’

With so much information conveyed via screens – especially capacitive touch screens – legibility and clarity have become an essential component of a modern car’s HMI. Volvo Centum is a sans serif of exceptional clarity and simplicity, designed for what the company calls ‘glance-driven environments.’

The first car to be installed with Volvo Centum is the newly revised XC60 mid-size SUV and its upcoming all-new EX60 electric sibling. Over-the-air updates will then be used to roll out the typeface across millions of other cars.

If there’s been one criticism of Volvo in recent years, it’s that the company has off-loaded huge amounts of information and driver input onto a central touchscreen. Volvo was ahead of the curve in adopting Google’s Android in 2017 and were a key partner in the development of Android Auto. How this system dovetails with the new typeface remains to be seen.

Dalton Maag faced a formidable challenge in ensuring Volvo Centum worked across the brand’s many platforms, as well as being legible in all driving conditions and in 35 different languages, including Chinese, Arabic, Japanese, and Korean.

By creating a set of distinct character shapes, the studio has striven to avoid any unintentional misreading, with clear spacing and a scaling system that simplifies detailed elements to retain legibility.

The studio, founded in 1991 by Swiss typeface designer Bruno Maag, has worked across a number of industries, including media (BBC, Netflix, USA Today), transportation (Ducati and Korean Air) and technology (Vodafone and Wix), amongst others.

DaltonMaag.com, @Dalton.Maag, Volvo.com, @Volvocars

Given the overwhelming numbers of SUVs on the roads, you’d be forgiven for thinking carmakers had given up on saloons. But when it comes to the luxury end of the spectrum, that niche is alive and well, particularly in terms of battery-powered options. Audi has the A6 e-tron, BMW the i5, Mercedes the EQE, Porsche has its performance-focused Taycan, and now Volvo has entered the fray with its new ES90, originally launched in China and now available elsewhere.

Strictly speaking, the new Volvo isn’t a saloon car. At first glance at the latest launch, in Monaco – the unofficial home of chauffeured cars – the ES90 visually sits somewhere between a low-slung saloon and its high-riding SUV sibling, the EX90. Volvo claims it’s a package that combines the ‘elegance of a sedan, the adaptability of a fastback and the spacious, elevated seating of an SUV’. While the design aspires to cover off a fair few bases, the overall package is still reassuringly a Scandi-modernist saloon, taking inspiration from cars like the 240 from the 1970s and the 740 from the 1990s.

From some angles it’s hard to look past the glaring bulge housing the lidar system on top of the windscreen, which is all-too similar to a London taxi cab’s glowing top light. The EX90 SUV also suffers with the same problem but Volvo is believed to be working on a solution. Other manufacturers, like Lotus, which is also owned by Volvo’s parent company Geely, have found a way to hide these sensors when they’re not required, with a system that pops up out of the roof only when the car is driving.

But get past that little niggle and the ES90 has pretty proportions and feels sleek, not chunky. Nevertheless, Volvo’s aesthetic is still reassuringly solid, with fuss-free surfacing that gives the car presence. Details like the ‘Thor’s hammer’ lights and smoothed, grilleless front end hint at the car’s electric underpinnings.

‘The ES90 is a car that strikes a balance between business and family life, offering people everyday versatility in the sleek shape of a modern electric car,’ says Erik Severison, chief product and strategy officer at Volvo Cars at the launch. ‘It is based on Volvo cars’ most advanced technology base, which it shares with our large, full electric SUV, the EX90. It is built smart with more computing power and impressive range and 800-volt technology for fast charging and high efficiency.’

Three powertrain options are available and a choice of two battery sizes – 92 kWh or 106 kWh battery. The standard, rear-wheel drive Single Motor ES90 has a WLTP range of 403 miles, and produces 328bhp from its 92kWh battery, which will cover off 0-62mph in 6.9 seconds. Only the Twin Motor, all-wheel drive gets the bigger 106kWh battery, which is good for 443bhp and 31 miles of range on paper, as well as a faster 0-62mph time of 5.6 seconds.

Sitting at the very top of the range is the Twin Motor Performance version, which manages to squeeze a heady 671bhp out of the 106kWh battery, while holding on to the same 434 miles of range and covering the 0-62mph dash in just 4.0 seconds.

On the road, the single-motor, rear-wheel drive is remarkably smooth and inside the cabin, there’s barely a whisper or buzz to be heard. Silent and smooth is the calling card of most luxury saloons, but very few manage to pull it off to the extent the ES90 has done.

Much of that is down to the (optional) dual-chamber air suspension, while the quiet in the cabin sets the stage for the optional Bower & Wilkins sound system, which is comprised of 25 high-fidelity speakers delivering immersive Dolby Atmos audio and a special ‘Abbey Road Studios Mode’. As a car to cover off long drives, the single-motor ES90 that I tested is a very comfortable and capable candidate.

Handling is in line with the car’s modest performance credentials but if pace is what you’re looking for, then hold out for the Performance model. The ES90 doesn’t claim to be a blisteringly quick super saloon and nor does it give off that impression when you drive it. It’s safe, steady and stately, as you’d expect from a 5m-long Volvo with Swedish sensibilities baked in.

On the inside, it’s spacious, modern and minimalist, particularly in the back where there’s an impressive amount of legroom and a refreshing lack of screens. As is the way with most software-focused cars, nearly all of the controls – climate, infotainment and driving settings – are buried in the large, black 14.5-inch central screen, which sits proud of the dashboard up front.

It’s not integrated, more a floating tablet that looks at odds with the beautifully designed dash, trimmed in ash wood, set against the cream-coloured leather upholstery. There’s also a neat, nine-inch driver display that replaces the traditional dials and a head-up display (HUD) to help the driver keep their eyes on the road.

As mentioned, the lidar bulge above the windscreen isn’t just for show – it enables sophisticated driver assistance, which Volvo calls Safe Space Technology. It’s powered by a potent dual Nvidia Drive AGX Orin processor and the ES90’s seven cameras, five radars, 12 ultrasonic sensors and, of course, the lidar, which give the car all-round vision and oversight of the driving environment, while collecting real-time data on the road ahead.

It’s impressive on the road and with a click down on the right indicator stalk, it will keep the ES90 within the lane and control the speed and identify any oncoming threats.

Both specifications at the launch were the single-motor, rear-wheel drive cars, which are available in Plus or Ultra specification. Prices start at £69,760 for the former and £79,160 for the latter. Judged against its main competitors – think Porsche Taycan, BMW i5 and Audi A6 e-Tron – the Volvo might be a slightly leftfield choice, but you’re rewarded with a sublime ride quality and unparalleled peace and quiet in the cabin.

The single-motor model won’t set the world alight when it comes to performance but that’s not what a luxury saloon is for. It’s for covering large distances comfortably, calmly and quietly and the ES90 is beautifully equipped for that.

As the latest chapter in Volvo’s electrification strategy, it’s an impressive step and a refreshing change from the waves of electric SUVs that continually pop up. Time will tell if the ES90 enjoys mass appeal as a £70,000-plus electric saloon but already, it’s got the upper hand on its main rivals as the considered and sophisticated alternative.

Volvo ES90, from £69,760, VolvoCars.com, @VolvoCars

Volvo has offered Cross Country versions of its regular cars for almost 30 years. The first one launched back in 1997 and with it the concept of a slightly raised ride height for uneven terrain, credible all-wheel drive technology for traction in most situations and rugged bodywork to resist scratches and scuffs from off-road manoeuvres was born.

The latest Volvo to offer the Cross Country badge is its smallest yet. The pocket-sized all-electric EX30 SUV is only 4233mm long – that’s bigger than an Audi Q2 and shorter than a Smart #1. But in keeping with the range’s ethos, when compared to the regular EX30, the Cross Country variant has 19mm higher ground clearance – 196mm vs. 177mm unladen – and sports wheel arch extensions, integrated front and rear lower bumper skid plates and slightly smaller 19in wheels.

Visually, an EX30 Cross Country model stands out for its large panel of dark matt cladding at the front, which is nicely enhanced with scored contour lines to subtly emphasise its outward-bound leanings. At the back, the lower section of the rear hatch has more dark cladding still and once a rugged roof rack and accessories have been added – a strapped-on kayak is optional – the vehicle looks more than ready for adventure.

This perception is backed up surprisingly well in driving reality on- and off-road. The EX30 Cross Country CC’s twin motors offer all-wheel drive and a very punchy 428hp, able to dispatch 0-60mph in ultra-rapid 3.5 seconds. And despite the car’s greater 1573mm height (vs. the regular EX30’s 1555mm) it handles itself with dignity at fast speeds on smooth tarmac and with surprising aplomb on heavily broken up dirt and flint tracks. Standard hill descent control and hill start assist help further and the 69kWh battery offers 265 miles of range before a recharge.

There are various driving modes for steering (soft, medium and firm), dynamics (range, standard and performance), plus one-pedal driving with low, medium and high regenerative braking settings. These offer useful variety, but changing any of the settings – or indeed switching on and off the various safety ‘boings’ or even opening the central glovebox – requires diving deep into the many layers within the 12.3in centre screen. A few key top-screen digital shortcuts would be better.

There is no driver’s display in front of the steering wheel either – which is highly unusual. This upset some reviewers of the regular EX30, but an electric car that can’t measure (or display) revolutions per minute and whose owners are unlikely to be watching their speed endlessly, should not equate to a purchasing deal-breaker. Instead, the EX30’s miles per hour are shown digitally in changing numbers – rather than via a circular dial and needle – on the top right of the centre screen.

After a period of short visual adjustment, I think it’s safe and logical. Along with electric window switches in the centre of the car rather than within each door armrest – to allow the front doors to be thinner – contribute to a more symmetrical design which reduces complexity and makes it less carbon-intensive to manufacture in left or right-hand drive. Which is a thoughtful (and very Volvo) thing to do.

The elegant interior has a quietly sophisticated Scandi chic colour and trim ambience. No fake materials are present, and some of the seat fabrics – like Nordic wool coated with pine resin and mixed with recycled polyester – look and feel ‘good’ in every sense. Min/max boot space is a decent 318/1000 litres and flexible and informative too, via two loading floor heights and a built-in infographic guide on the boot roof’s underside to inform users about key measurements and thus what luggage might fit inside.

Throw in a fixed panoramic roof, Google Automotive Services, a dashboard soundbar with seven speakers, plus Apple and Android mirror screening to keep things modern and the EX30 Cross Country has much to commend it. Able to cope with most rough stuff, but in a very compact and sophisticated way.

Volvo EX30 Cross Country, from £47,005, VolvoCars.com, @VolvoCars

Volvo is doubling down on its Swedish identity with the unveiling of the newest model in its line-up, the diminutive EX30 Cross Country. Already hailed as one of the best small EVs out there (and the winner of a Wallpaper* Smart Space award to boot), the EX30 has been a success for a company keen to appear rooted in the Scandinavian tradition of warm, minimal but friendly contemporary design.

Those characteristics are amplified by the EX30 Cross Country, a lightly upgraded version of the EV that adds a more rugged appearance and a few other choice features. Volvo has been making ‘Cross Country’ models since the late 90s, essentially estate cars with a raised ride height and bolder styling that put them in the hinterland between wagon and SUV.

The little EX30 marks a departure in that it was never billed as an estate car in the first place, although it also doesn’t have much of a claim to SUV-ness. The Cross Country version should dispel the confusion, giving the car a durable, outdoorsy image that’s very much at home in a world awash with technical outerwear and socials-friendly hikes.

It’s a state of being Volvo is happy to lean into, beginning its press release with the words, ‘Sweden is our home. Deep lakes, endless forests, great mountain ranges, some of the harshest winters on the planet – and some of the best and most enjoyable cars ever made.’

Making the case for the new car as something akin to a mountain bike or a pair of sturdy walking boots, the EX30 Cross Country is, we’re told, ‘an experience, not just a car.’

Partnering with Swedish outdoor brand Fjällräven for the launch event, the EX30 Cross Country is seen here in what Volvo hopes it’ll be the car’s natural habitat, a winter cabin. In addition to the raised ride height, there’s the option of 18-inch all-terrain tyres to make the all-wheel drive system even more efficient.

As an EV, the EX30 CC has impressive stats, with a maximum range of 265 miles (427km) and fast-charging capabilities for the 69kWh battery. There’s subtle Cross Country branding on the front and rear, with a map graphic on the blanked-out front, a stylised representation of the topography of the Arctic Swedish Kebnekaise mountain range. Wheel arches are also subtly flared to round off the exterior enhancements.

Inside, the Cross Country model is just as minimal as its sibling, with plenty of clever storage (some of which is removable) as well as hard-wearing textile seats, dashboard and door cards. It’s a car that thinks it’s a backpack, and is equally flexible in how you use it.

Volvo EX30 Cross Country, VolvoCars.com, car configurator

https://www.volvocars.com/uk/news/electrification/experience-the-volvo-ex30-cross-country/

https://www.volvocars.com/intl/build/ex30-electric

It’s time to re-sample Volvo’s EX30 and ponder on what makes it such a special car. When the EX30 was announced last year the compact, trim stance of this small SUV represented a different, more acceptable take on that most benighted segment of the car market, and after driving it on the launch in Barcelona earlier this year, these preconceptions were confirmed. It’s one of the best EVs on the market.

As a result, the Volvo EX30 is now a bona fide award winner, with a Wallpaper* Smart Space Award to its name, as well as a cluster of accolades from other publications, plus acknowledgement in the 2024 Red Dot Design Awards. Taking the EX30 onto UK roads to see if the well-chosen routes and generous hospitality of a car launch had impacted excessively on our feelings, did nothing to disabuse us of its abilities.

With three model choices – Single Motor, Single Motor Extended Range and Twin Motor Performance, the benefits and downsides of EV ownership are laid out starkly; the cheapest car has the poorest range, whilst the most expensive model has the best acceleration.

Naturally we’d suggest going somewhere in the middle, where a 295.8 mile combined range can be found (up to 367.9 miles in urban driving, according to Volvo). The top spec model provides frankly incredibly performance for a car in this sector, let alone a family EV (3.6 seconds to 100km/h), and can charge from 10-80% in half an hour.

But now there’s a competitor, a car that’s cut from the same cloth (as we will see later), but which offers a rather different aesthetic approach. The Smart #3 is car two from the reborn Smart brand, following on from the Smart #1 (yes, one pronounces the hashtag out loud), launched in 2022.

The #3 offers exactly the same charging benefits and only a mildly shorter range (283 miles) than the EX30. Performance also reaches parity with the Volvo, but only if you specify the BRABUS special edition, which costs £45,450, knocks the range down to 258 miles but gives the all-important (to some) acceleration figure of 0-100km/h in 3.7 seconds. The Smart has a 66kWh battery, whilst the mid and upper level EX30 offer a 69kWh unit.

It's all too close to call, but time spent with both cars revealed a sharper, more focused character to the way the Volvo tackles the road and corners in particular. The Smart #3 never feels quite that dialled in, but it has a perkier interior, with rather less hairshirt minimalism than the Volvo. However, where Volvo has partnered with Google for its generally excellent display and interface, the #3’s designers seem to have mistaken babyish for cute.

Hence you get a cartoonish world map as a symbol for the nav system and, worse still, an animated cheetah that serves as a visual avatar for the car’s voice recognition system. This character inhabits the Smart’s dashboard monitor, occasionally stretching its pixelated limbs. And would never fly in Volvo’s world of logical modernism. Instead, neat touches include the little IKEA-style diagram baked in the boot lining to neatly illustrate the maximum available dimensions.

Both brands rely on these little flashes of design eccentricity to emphasise their overall message and ethos, but overall the Volvo is less cloying and twee. It’s a more grown up car, and feels too mature for some of the Smart idiosyncrasies that feel less than smart, like the baffling pebble-like keyfob. While Volvo has partnered with Google for mapping and Bowers & Wilkins for its audio, the Smart gets speakers from Beats Audio.

Overall, however, the two cars are incredibly evenly matched. Of course there’s a reason for this, and that reason is Geely. The Chinese company has been Volvo’s steward for many years now, bringing investment, factories and technology to the Swedish company without seemingly affecting its core values or its essential ‘Volvo-ness’. Smart is a slightly different matter.

The company’s origins dates back to the early 80s, when the late watch entrepreneur Nicolas Hayek sought to apply the hugely successful marketing and technical underpinnings of his Swatch brand to the auto industry. The ‘Swatchmobile’ quickly became a co-project with VW, only to be canned by incoming VW Group CEO Ferdinand Piëch. In 1994, Hayek inked in a deal with Daimler-Benz, owners of Mercedes.

The car that came to define the Smart brand, the two-seater City-Coupé, later renamed the fortwo, came out of this partnership. The name Swatchmobile got lost along the way, although ‘smart’, the eventual nomenclature, allegedly evolved from a compromised solution, ‘S’watch ‘M’ercedes ‘ART’.

In 2019, Daimler tapped Geely to re-shape and re-invigorate the Smart brand in the face of growing EV competition, using the Chinese giant’s well-honed electrification skills (as an aside, Smart has always been branded with a lower-case ‘s’, the type of decision that plays havoc with written text, so apologies for not conforming to it here).

Smart #3 followed in 2023. Both cars use the same platform, albeit slightly lengthened in the case of the #3. Also sharing that platform? The Volvo EX30. Both are Chinese made: the EX30 is built in Zhangjiakou, while the #3 is built in Xi'an.

From 2025, the Volvo will also be built in Ghent, Belgium, alongside the XC40 and C40 models, partly as a way to circumvent increasingly stringent Chinese import tariffs. How these will impact Smart’s European revival are yet to be seen. Late last year, Volvo previewed the EX30 Cross Country, reviving the brand’s line-up of chunkier styled, more off-road capable models.

Whereas Volvo has a very accomplished line-up of models ranging from the EX30 up to the large EX90 and XC90, the Smart #3 is (confusingly) only the second model from the new generation iteration of the brand. Next up is Smart #5 (also confusingly), a full-size SUV that puts the final nail in the coffin of Nicholas Hayek’s vision of an ultra-compact city car that’s playfully styled and as precisely engineered as a Swiss watch.

With two vehicles that are ostensibly identical in price and performance and differentiated only by design, the Smart and the Volvo showcase the challenges facing the global car market, a place where the application individuality risks tipping into caricature if not done with care. The Smart is a fine car with some distracting eccentricities. The Volvo, on the other hand, just gets things done without unnecessary fuss.

Volvo EX30, from £32,850 for Single Motor model. Twin Motor Performance model from £41,600, VolvoCars.com, @VolvocarUK

Smart #3, from £32,950, BRABUS Performance edition from £45,450, UK.Smart.com, @Smart_Worldwide

Volvo is trying to think a little differently and apply a minimal Scandinavian ethos to its current EV line-up. The act of packaging everything required to make an all-electric full-size SUV – most crucially a big battery – invariably results in a large, ludicrously swift and rather OTT object. Is the new EX90 something more?

The EX90 is the spark-powered sibling of the newly refreshed XC90, the big SUV that first arrived all the way back in 2002 and rapidly became the de facto family car for huge swathes of Europe and America, usurping the estate car and setting us all on a path to SUV ubiquity. This dubious distinction aside, the XC90 has always been atypical of the breed, with a less domineering character despite its scale, a friendly Swedish sheen that’s entirely alien to a BMW or Range Rover.

The EX90 shares similar proportions and packaging but is otherwise a completely different piece of engineering. Nevertheless, it mostly retains the Volvo ethos, honed over decades of quiet, determined brand development that has earned the company its reputation for unflashy design and rock-solid safety credentials.

However, this image of a Volvo hewn from a solid lump of Swedish granite was rather undermined by a few spots of dubious build quality on our test car, built at Volvo’s facility in Charleston, South Carolina. The EX90 will also be made in Daqing, China, primarily for that market, where it will be fielded amongst a growing number of dedicated electric SUVs, many of which share its underpinnings courtesy of parent company Geely.

With a fresh round of import tariffs being imposed on Chinese-made cars, the once huge advantages of manufacturing there have been effectively wiped out, leaving companies scrambling to revise sales predictions in foreign markets.

How will that impact on Volvo going forwards? In addition to the EX90, the EX30 also lands in the US soon, a twin-pronged assault on a market weaned on Teslas but now in search of something different. However, it’s no longer enough to rely on the ‘boxy but good’ cliché of the past, especially in image-conscious California, so these new electric Volvos need to deliver a spark as well as practicality.

We attended the EX90’s American launch to find out for ourselves. This particular part of California is moneyed but unadventurous. Apart from the occasional bloom of boho esoterica along the edges of the Pacific coast, too much of Irvine County and Newport Beach in particular, is given over to over-scaled taupe recreations of an imagined Tuscan idyll, Italy via Disney, valet parking and biting cold air-conditioning that’ll set your teeth on edge.

Our hotel took this to extremes, with cascading neo-Roman villas set alongside the inevitable golf course, complete with pseudo viaducts, a ‘coliseum’ (a restaurant around a circular pool) with a defiantly ersatz temple of Diana located in the middle of the links. It was an environment that couldn’t be less Swedish if it tried, and the strong Californian sunshine even seemed to burn off some of the team’s enthusiasm for their own product.

As a result, the EX90 was very much left to speak for itself on the broad highways and arid SoCal landscapes, with only a brief interlude along twisting canyon roads. Although the Sand Dune paint helped it blend into the arid architecture and landscape, our first impressions were of an understated, elegant car.

The EX90 has boatloads of clever tech concealed beneath a smooth, unruffled surface. As we’ll see, this is both good and bad, although the headline news is that Volvo’s interface is one of the best in the business, with Google-aided mapping, clean, readable text and an overall aura of quality and class.

Bright and cheerful interior is helped by a combination of a full-length rooflight and 72 SunLike LEDs, sourced from South Korea. Trim is finished in a special Nordico upholstery, made from recycled materials, as an alternative to leather, and a host of other benefits, including air suspension, soft close doors, four-zone climate control and 22-inch wheels.

Volvo only has the Twin Motor version of the EX90 available right now, with a cheaper single motor model on the way. The launch event offered two levels of performance, Twin Motor Ultra and Twin Motor Performance Ultra. Although the latter offers the equivalent of 517hp and a sub 5.0 second sprint to 62mph, both have the same maximum range, 374 miles.

The fastest available charging facilities (250kW) will take the 111kW battery from ten to 80 per cent in half an hour. So far, so good, and even better on the open road, where the refinement is absolutely top class. The powertrain is smooth and silent, and the EX90 only gives away its quite considerable weight when braking heavily or tackling a corner at speed.

Although the latter is not an especially ‘Volvo’ activity, you can rest assured that safety – both active and passive – is still highly regarded within the company. One of Volvo’s top engineers explained how the company still honours its commitment to investigate every single Volvo-related accident within an hour of their Gothenburg HQ, building up a vast database in the process.

That said, there are a couple of baffling UI decisions that seem to go against this core principle of safety first. Adjusting the mirrors and steering wheel is done via a combination of touch screen and dreaded capacitive buttons, whilst even the glovebox must be opened via the screen.

Volvo’s DNA can’t help but feel diluted by these decisions, especially when barely 20 years ago it boasted that its ‘climate control systems are designed to be simple and easy to operate, with clear, logical symbols and controls that can be operated with gloves on’, helpful in a snowy Swedish suburb or a chilly Coloradan ski resort. That prosaic approach seemingly no longer applies now that all HVAC controls are relegated to the screen. Thankfully there’s still a (rotary) volume dial on the centre console.

Other highlights include the presence of seven seats, although the six seat option, with its tiny central aisle, feels more spacious. We can also attest that the standard 25-speaker Bowers & Wilkins system with Dolby Atmos is genuinely astonishing, one of the best we’ve ever experienced in a car – helped hugely by the simplicity of the cabin and the EX90’s exceptional refinement and lack of noise.

One downside of the era of the connected car is that all features might not be available at launch time. Volvo was rumoured to be keeping several functional aspects back until the car’s first OS update, including adding more power and capability to the LiDAR sensor that sits prominently above the windscreen. This too has been harnessed by the safety team, adding another layer of data collection (on top of radar sensors and cameras) to build up a comprehensive picture of the car’s environment.

With autonomy no longer the buzzword it once was – and no company willing to be drawn on a timescale – expect sensors to be given over to safety functions, rather than the science fiction that is total self-driving. Whilst driving characteristics can be carefully for each brand and market, just like physical design, it’s also worth noting that under the EX90 is a platform shared with the Polestar 3.

The EX90 should be an easy win for Volvo, especially in markets that have completely and utterly succumbed to the SUV. Although it doesn’t have the verve and compact chic of the EX30, it’s an accomplished and refined machine and the best electric seven seater on the market.

Volvo EX90 Twin Motor Ultra, from £96,255, VolvoCars.com, @VolvoCars

We launched the annual Wallpaper* Smart Space Awards in 2021, partly as a response to our locked-down brains desiring more expansive, innovative and life-enhancing technology, but also as a way to highlight how a focus on longevity, quality and repairability needn’t distract the sheer diversity of design approaches.

That list of 2021's winners set a high standard, and we were delighted that the award grew in stature and scope – you can see the 2022 winners and 2023 winners on the site.

Wallpaper* Smart Space Award 2024 winners

Judged by Wallpaper* editor-in-chief Bill Prince, alongside tech & transport editor Jonathan Bell and business director Kelly Gray, the winners of the Wallpaper* Smart Space Awards 2024 offer an impressive selection of innovation, sustainability, simplicity and style. Read on to find out who is top of their game.

Best Sustainable Step Forward for the Home

LG Electronics WashCombo All-in-One

Out of the many outstanding entries we received, this clever combination product impressed the judges and emerged as a clear winner thanks to its mix of clean lines and emphasis on both energy-saving and space efficiency. With the ability to wash and dry a load of clothes in under two hours, and a clever inverter system for minimising energy use, the WashCombo also has an impressive 5 cubic feet capacity and a sleek, unobtrusive look.

LG Electronics WashCombo All-in-One, LG.com, @LGUSA

Best Sustainable Step Forward for the Office

Framery Four booth

Framery Acoustics specialises in shrinking big spaces without compromising comfort or flexibility. The company’s Framery Four meeting pod really stood out for the way it transforms an office interior with minimum energy and materials, creating a meeting space for up to four people with fresh air and an eerily quiet ambience.

Framery Four, FrameryAcoustics.com, @FrameryAcoustics

Best Sustainable Step Forward for Mobility

Polestar 2

Polestar 2’s victory in the best Sustainable Step Forward category is all the more impressive given the model is now in its fifth year of production. That hasn’t stopped the company from continuously refining and improving the car, however, and not just in terms of range and software. Part of Polestar’s ethos is to chip away at the embedded cost of manufacturing, highlighting ways for manufacturers of all stripes to be more transparent about the complexities of decarbonising supply chains and manufacturing.

Polestar 2, Polestar.com, @PolestarCars

Collaboration of the Year

Kohler Formation 02 Smart Toilet

The Kohler Formation 02 Smart Toilet was an unexpected but welcome collaboration between Dr Samuel Ross' SR_A design studio and the established American bathroom brand Kohler. The result impressed us for its boldness of colour and form, transforming a familiar object into something really special.

Kohler Formation 02 Smart Toilet, SRA.Kohler.com, Kohler.com, SR-A.com

Fittest Fitness Kit

Unica by Technogym

Technogym’s ongoing commitment to design excellence is embodied in the classic Unica system, which demonstrates the solid principles underpinning the Italian company. Unica might be nearly four decades old, but it is an enduring classic, a home multi gym system trusted by professional trainers and athletes.

Unica by Technogym, Technogym.com, @Technogym

Food, Drink and Design

Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer

Ninja has created a countertop classic that impressed the judges with its sensible use of space and high quality look and feel. The simple act of stacking the drawers on top of each other makes the Double Stack XL an ideal candidate for a compact kitchen, offering the energy saving abilities of an air fryer without compromising capacity.

Ninja Double Stack XL 9.5L Air Fryer, NinjaKitchen.co.uk, @NinjaKitchenuk

Greatest Outdoor Design

The Peep Show Video Birdhouse

We loved this elegant mix of technology and nature, creating something that benefits everyone. Not only is the egg-shaped wood and bio-plastic structure acclaimed for its longevity and suitability for all kinds of species, the camera slot allows you to check in on your new feathered friends all year round.

The Peep Show, ThePeepShow.com, @ThePeepShowBirdhouse

Best Life Enhancing Object on the Move

BOOX Palma

An e-reader device of impressive execution and ability, the Palma is a great way of getting information away from a conventional screen. Pairing phone-sized portability with an e-ink screen, the Palma is a robust, simple and distraction-free way of imbibing information in an age of polychromatic diversions.

BOOX Palma, Shop.BOOX.com

Best Life Enhancing Object in the Home

eufy Robot Vacuum Omni S1 Pro

Home automation done well always ticks our boxes and the Omni S1 is a smart addition to a modern home. Powerful and smart, with a self-cleaning system incorporated into its charging dock, the Omni S1 is a mechanised mopper that’ll keep floor surfaces pristine.

eufy Robot Vacuum Omni S1 Pro, eufy.com

Most Illuminating Lighting

Fleur by Foscarini

In the words of the judges, ‘We love this concept for bringing two elements together in such style.’ Fleur is a table lamp that doubles up as a vase, with a transparent glass support that’ll take water and flowers while also providing a soft illumination. The light is filtered through the water-filled glass, adding another dimension to your arrangements.

Fleur, Foscarini, Foscarini.com

Most Intelligent Domestic Device

Dyson 360 Vis Nav robot vacuum cleaner

We were especially impressed by the Vis Nav’s sensor system and agility, but its key selling point is power. The company claims it offers up to six times the suction of other robot vacuums, and the deep blue device can scuttle up to the edge of walls and under low furniture to ensure as much space as possible remains dust free.

Dyson 360 Vis Nav, Dyson.co.uk, @Dyson

Most Masterful Music Device in the Home

Ruark R810 High Fidelity Radiogram

A beautifully made piece of technology that looks great even when it’s not in use, the R810 is a worthy winner of our Home Audio category. Pairing high quality cabinetmaking with a world’s worth of streaming services makes the R810 the ultimate piece of audio furniture.

Ruark R810 High Fidelity Radiogram, RuarkAudio.com, @RuarkAudio

Most Masterful Music Device on the Move

Nothing Ear (a) wireless earbuds

The latest in a rapidly expanding line of dynamic and distinctive audio products, Nothing’s latest pair of wireless earbuds, the Ear (a) offer excellent quality for a very reasonable price. The judges praised their playful use of colour, straightforward usability and great sound.

Nothing Ear (a), Nothing.tech, @Nothing

Most Revolutionary Transport

Volvo EX30

Volvo’s EX30 is a fantastic piece of automotive design, with clear and welcome influences from product design and contemporary furniture and great use of sustainably sourced materials. Despite some teething troubles with the company’s software, the EX30 drives beautifully and has an excellent range, making it one of the best compact EVs on the market.

Volvo EX30, VolvoCars.com, @VolvoCars

Most Watchable TV

Samsung S95D television

Samsung continues to demonstrate why it's one of the world’s leading electronics brands with the excellent S95D, a 4K OLED TV with a 55in screen. The judges described this as ‘an impeccable piece of product design from Samsung, with an impossibly thin screen and seamless connectivity.’

Samsung S95D, Samsung.com

Most Wonderful Wearable

OnePlus Watch 2 Nordic Blue Edition

This Nordic Blue Edition of the Watch 2 is a classically elegant alternative to the smartwatch status quo. Offering excellent durability as well as timeless style, the Watch 2 has up to 100 hours of battery life, a large 1.43in AMOLED display and an ultra-rugged design to give it a long lifespan.

OnePlus Watch 2 Nordic Blue Edition, OnePlus.com, @OnePlus

Smartest Luggage

Horizn M5 Smart Cabin Luggage

We’re great admirers of Horizn’s blend of technology and quality, and the M5 is thankfully more of the same. With a 37-litre capacity and the company’s trademark integral (and removable) charger, the M5 Smart cabin luggage is light, safe, spacious and makes extensive use of recycled materials. It’ll help you go places, without doubt.

Horizn M5 Smart, Horizn-Studios.co.uk, @HoriznStudios

Best Gadget on the Move

Nextbase iQ dash cam

The iQ is a next generation dash cam that shakes up a staid sector, with impressive specifications and ease of use. The smartness comes from the cam’s ability to stream to your mobile when you’re parked up, transforming your car into a sensor-laded security camera regardless of where you are. There’s also a special ‘witness mode’ and up to 4K recording.

Nextbase iQ dashcam, Nextbase.co.uk

Mightiest Mobile Phone

Nothing Phone (2a)

When the Phone (2a) debuted earlier this year, it offered up a genuinely different approach to a relatively staid sector. Nothing makes no compromise on form, function or capability, but still imbue the (2a) with characterful hardware and software design that makes it tempting diversion from the status quo.

Nothing Phone (2a), Nothing.tech, @Nothing

Highly Commended

There was an exceptionally high standard of entries this year, and not every submitted design could be heralded a winner. However, as before, the judging team felt that certain entries deserved to be honoured as ‘highly commended’. These are the runners-up for 2024, representing high quality design and execution and certainly not to be overlooked.

Highly Commended: Best Sustainable Step Forward for the Home: Alder Collection by Mater

The Alder Collection demonstrated an impressive approach to materiality and expression of form. Designed by Patricia Urquiola, the stools, tables and side tables of the Alder Collection use ‘Matek’, a material formed from coffee or wood waste and biodegradable plastic.

Alder Collection, MaterDesign.com, PatriciaUrquiola

Highly Commended: Best Sustainable Step Forward for the Office: 100% Recycled Textures Collection by 3form

Under the banner ‘no new plastic’, we admired 3form’s commitment to creating a high quality, fully recycled material would have major benefits for workspace product design.

Textures Collection, 3-form.com

Highly Commended: Food, Drink and Design category: Space cookware range from Joseph Joseph

What makes the Space range great is Joseph Joseph’s clever folding handle mechanism. As a result, the stacking set takes up less space in your cupboard.

Space range, JosephJoseph.com

Highly Commended: Greatest Outdoor Design: Sonos Move 2

It’s a delight to find Sonos’ excellent audio skills packaged into a device that can be taken out and about in confidence. Naturally, the Move 2 syncs with your existing system as well.

Sonos Move 2, Sonos.com

Highly Commended: Best Life Enhancing Object in the Home: Blueair Blue Pure 211i Max

Simple and straightforward, with interchangeable filters and quiet operation, we reckon the Blue Pure 211i Max would look great in any contemporary home.

Blueair Blue Pure 211i Max, Blueair.com

Highly Commended: Best Life Enhancing Object or Space: 3D SNAP Store by Reiichi Ikeda Design

Tokyo’s 3D SNAP store is a playful retail experiment – create a 3D figurine of your dog using a special scanner and printer – that Ikeda shaped in an exquisite way.

Reiichi Ikeda Design, ReiichiIkeda.com, @ReiichiIkedaDesign

Highly Commended: Most Illuminating Lighting: Minima by Patkau Architects

A clever physical manifestation of the interaction of 2D and 3D forms, Patkau’s approach results in a sculptural light with real character.

Minima Lamp, Patkau.ca

Highly Commended: Most Intelligent Domestic Device: Anthem Digital Shower by Kohler

A truly sybaritic shower installation, the Anthem was both inspirational and aspirational with almost limitless installation options.

Anthem Collection by Kohler, StudioKohler.com

Highly Commended: Most Masterful Music Device in the Home: Loutd musegg

The judges described this impressive streaming speaker (a standout among sculptural speakers) as being ‘eccentric without losing its elegant edge, with pioneering use of materials and packaging.’

Musegg by Loutd, Loutd.com, @Loutd.speaker

Highly Commended: Most Masterful Music Device in the Home: Nocs Monolith X Aluminum speaker

An impressive piece of industrial design, the Monolith X Aluminum brings high levels of build quality and recycled metal together in a great-sounding and -looking speaker.

Monolith X Aluminum, Nocs.design, @Nocsdesign

Highly Commended: Most Watchable TV: Loewe Stellar television

The Stellar’s unexpected materiality, high repairability and all-round attention to detail hugely impressed us. Combing wafer thin concrete with aluminium, the Stellar is an OLED TV that should last for generations.

Loewe Stellar, Loewe.tv

Highly Commended: Most Wonderful Wearable: read on light reading glasses

Beautifully packaged and presented, the glasses make a hitherto overlooked object into something that's highly desirable.

Glasses by read on, readon-mobile.ch

Just over a decade ago, Wallpaper* published its first article on Kia as ‘one to watch’. Ten years on, the previously value-led South Korean brand has become established as a maker of well-built mainstream global automotive products and more recently, a desirable premium contender in the specifically full-electric EV segment. 

Kia EV3 electric crossover revealed

Kia’s consistent focus on strong design has been the key, via various excellent hires from more established and historic marques, including Audi, Bentley and BMW, and this approach is exhibited perfectly in its new Kia EV3 small crossover. 

It’s the second major EV to launch under the watchful eye of Karim Habib, Kia’s global head of design since 2019 and shares the geometric-and-chunky exterior approach of its much bigger brother – the 5m-plus long Kia EV9 – but in a much more compact and affordable package. 

Kia insiders are quick to namecheck the Volvo EX30 as a rival and although the EV3 is a little longer, the two vehicles’ equally smart designs and shared emphasis on sustainability gives that view credence. Based on an EV-only platform with a choice of two battery pack sizes placed between the axles, cabin space is maximised and front and rear overhangs minimised. 

From a design point of view, to balance the pushed-forward windscreen at the front, there is a thick body-coloured C-pillar a the rear, horizontally split by a gloss-black section near the roof. This strong graphically led approach is mirrored in the front and rear sections – and in the unusual wheel designs – via carefully positioned black elements to break up the body colour.

Case in point, the EV3’s sides have a lower ground clearance than usual for a crossover, to help achieve a commendable 0.26 Cd aerodynamic figure – but that greater bodyside depth is visually offset by a moustache-shaped black ‘rocker panel’ detail. 

Take a closer look and there are some neat chamfered edges to the body work as well, which carefully help to integrate the front and rear light clusters and smooth transitions in surface, material or shutlines.

The interior is a calm design – just like the EV9 – and shares its three-screens-in-one-frame driver infotainment approach, plus a good smattering of physical buttons and switches. 

The EV3 has been considered for its function while stationary as well as while moving. In the centre, between the front seats, Kia designers have integrated a good-sized horizontally deploying front table that slides out from the centre console to provide a practical resting place for food, drink or even a laptop when the car is still (perhaps while charging). As VP of Kia interior design Jochen Paesen explains: ‘It’s not just about driving, it’s about that “living room” feel and multi-use case scenario.‘

For a compact car, rear legroom and headroom is very good and it doesn’t feel like a second-class experience compared to the front.  Smart grey marl-style fabric wraps around the upper front seatbacks and smartphone charging points are usefully integrated midway up both seatbacks’ sides. The boot’s flat floor can be lowered to create more space and the EV3’s charging cables have their own dedicated space under the front bonnet.

Recycled plastic PET is deployed across the seats, headliner and floor mats, among ‘Ten Must Have’ sustainable items that Kia has enforced upon itself. There’s a welcome layer of transparency to this approach too, in the shape of a small QR code printed on the far passenger side edge of the dashboard that, via a smartphone click-through to a website, highlights where Kia’s recycled materials are being used.   

On sale first in South Korea from July 2024, the EV3 will land in Europe in the second half of 2024, with other, yet-to-be-confirmed regions after that. A 204hp electric motor with a choice of two battery options – a 81.4kWh pack good for 373 miles (600km) and a 58.3kWh unit able to provide 255 miles (410km) – should start at circa £35,000. At this price point, the practical as well as stylish Kia EV3 should find many more new customers to the brand.

Kia EV3, more information at Kia.com

This round-up of 24 transportation design innovations for 2024 is driven by curiosity rather than any attempt to be comprehensive. The following machines – whether wheeled, winged or just seats or buildings – are all dedicated to making mobility just a little bit easier, more elegant and, hopefully, more efficient. Some are practically in the bag, while others may be subject to slight delays. Read on to discover some of the many ways we’re hoping to get around this year.

Transportation design innovations to expect this year

Lotus Emeya

Lotus’ Eletre SUV was a hugely credible start to the company’s latest revival. 2024 will see the launch of the Lotus Emeya, a four-door sports EV that’s aimed squarely at the current market leader the Porsche Taycan. Sharper styling, innovative tech and graphics and sharp handling are all promised. 

LotusCars.com

Porsche Panamera 

The latest version of Porsche’s mighty Panamera amps up the electrical content for more range and performance, all the while refining the design of the company’s original four-door sporting GT. The outgoing generation was one of our favourite fast four-doors, and the new model looks set to exceed it in every respect. 

Porsche.com

Volkswagen ID.7

Another big saloon, albeit cut from a slightly less sporting mould, Volkswagen ID.7 is the latest model in its all-electric line-up. With a projected range of around 384 miles, the ID.7 is set to be one of the longest-legged EVs to debut this year. 

Volkswagen.co.uk

BMW i5 Touring

BMW’s i5 Touring is the first application of electrification to the company’s traditionally styled estate cars. While estates have been overlooked for too long in favour of SUVs, there’s also an EV estate on the way from Audi, signalling a slight but significant shift in the scale of aspirational cars. 

BMW.co.uk

Hyundai Ioniq 7

Previewed by the Ioniq Concept ‘Seven’ from 2021 (shown here), the forthcoming Ioniq 7 is pitched as the Korean company’s flagship SUV model. Closely related to Kia’s EV9, the Ioniq 7 will be spacious and flexible, as well as distinctively designed.  

Hyundai.co.uk

Cupra Tavascan

Cupra is ploughing ahead with its conversion to a pure EV company. Next up is the Tavascan, a fast-back compact SUV that’s the most coherent representation to date of the Spanish company’s strangely gothic form language. 

CupraOfficial.co.uk

MG Cyberster

As the first electric convertible sportscar to market, the Cyberster is going to attract a lot of attention. Considerably larger than the compact MGs of old, the Chinese-owned brand is still hoping to capture some of their original magic. 

MG.co.uk

Polestar 4

Polestar previews its products well ahead of time, so the shape and style of the 4 is no surprise. Following on from the Polestar 3, an SUV, the Polestar 4 is an SUV coupé, a crucial stylistic distinction that gives this car an elegant silhouette. 

Polestar.com

Volvo EX90

Also incoming from Sweden is the new Volvo EX90, a seven-seater SUV that looks set to embody all the archetypal Volvo qualities – safety, practicality, steadfast style – in an all-electric package.  

VolvoCars.com

Fiat 600e

The upcoming Fiat 600e is much more than an upscaled 500e. Sharing a platform with Jeep’s accomplished Avenger, this modestly sized EV uses Fiat’s friendly design DNA for a more practical everyday proposition. 

Fiat.co.uk

Citroën ë-C3

Billed as the first ‘affordable European electric car’, the Citroën ë-C3 channels the spirit of its stripped-down Ami microcar and Oli concept. With an upright stance, simplified visual language and sub €25k price, the company is positioning this as a 2CV for the 21st century. 

Citroen.co.uk

New Mini EVs

The electrification of Mini gathers pace in 2024 with electric versions of the Mini Countryman and Cooper on the way, along with the Aceman crossover SUV. 

Mini.co.uk

Volocopter Air Taxi

While all the four-wheeled debuts are signposted way in advance, innovations in aerial transport rarely commit to fixed timescales. Air taxi start-up Volocopter has vouched to have a service up and running for this summer's Paris Olympics; will this prove over-ambitious? 

Volocopter.com

CityAirbus NextGen

Airbus Industry’s CityAirbus NextGen is still very much a prototype machine, but 2024 should see this all-electric, four-seater eVTOL aircraft take its first flight. The eVTOL market is crowded with concepts but the backing of Europe’s largest aeronautics company makes this one to watch. 

Airbus.com

Wisk Aero

US air taxi developer Wisk Aero is assembling the production prototype of its sixth-generation aircraft in California with a view to flying the fully autonomous four-seater craft sometime this year. Wisk’s strategy of skipping human pilots altogether is markedly different from potential competitors. 

Wisk.aero

Hill Helicopters HX50

Compared to the futuristic forms proposed by the eVTOL companies, Hill Helicopters is somewhat conventional. Building a traditional rotorcraft from scratch is still a tall order, and the UK-based is focusing on first-time buyers with its sleekly designed five-seater.

HillHelicopters.com

Passenger Terminal, Mumbai

Also coming online late this year are the passenger terminals and control tower at Mumbai’s new D.B. Patil International Airport. Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects in the firm’s characteristic expressive modernist style, the pavilion-like terminals will be surrounded by lakes and feature voluminous curved roofs. 

NMIAirport.co.in

LAX APM System

Although mass transit and the United States go together like oil and water, Los Angeles Airport has made an effort with its new automated people mover (APM) system. Linking LAX’s terminals with transport nodes outside the airport itself is a start, but in a country where Disney World’s monorail system is allegedly the 9th largest mass transit system, don’t expect any Elizabeth Line-style grand gestures.

LAWA.org

Lufthansa Allegris seating

Lufthansa passengers will finally get an uplift in every class in 2024, as the company rolls out its long-awaited new Allegris seating systems. First and Business Class customers flying the airline’s newest A350 and 787 will get the upgrade this summer. 

Lufthansa.com

Air New Zealand Skynest

Air New Zealand runs some of the longest-haul routes in the world. To make the journey fly by, the company is rolling out its innovative Skynest bunks for passengers flying to New York and Chicago, both 15-plus-hour routes. The pod-like system, designed by Kate Cameron-Donald and Zoe Wenn, offers six bunks that can be pre-booked for a chunk of in-flight sleep.

AirNewZealand.com

Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom Air

We’ve already previewed the sleek Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom Air electric speedboat, a collaboration between the sports car maker and the historic Austrian boatbuilder. This year will see first customer deliveries of this super watercraft. 

FrauscherxPorsche.com

Blue Innovations Group R30

Another electric boat to watch out for is BIG’s R30. A 30ft cabin cruiser, the R30 is designed for the big time, pitched at pleasure boat users seeking a multifunctional vessel with zero emissions, with a flexible interior and deck configuration. On-board solar helps top up the battery. 

BlueInnovationGroup.com

BMW Motorrad CE 02

Following on from the launch of the CE 04, BMW Motorrad is branching out with another electric scooter, the CE 02. With a chunkier, more stripped-back style, this is a bike aimed at riders of every ability. 

BMW-Motorrad.co.uk

Stilride 1

Stilride’s debut electric scooter is diametrically different in style to BMW’s offering, with an expressive body formed from origami-inspired bent steel. The Swedish company says the Stilride 1 will get around 120km of range, while its clever construction saves material, waste and labour. 

Stilride.com

In stark contrast to the ultra-compact new Volvo EX30, the brand has now announced a vehicle at the opposite end of the size spectrum. The new Volvo EM90 is billed as a ‘premium MPV’, ‘a space for living on the move’, not just a straightforward mode of transport. It’s fully electric, with a platform shared with the Zeekr 009 MPV, another Geely sub-brand that is making inroads into Europe.

Notably, this boxy six-seater has not only been launched in China but will, for the time being, only be available for the Chinese market. It’s an indication of just how important chauffeured car culture continues to be in the People's Republic, as well as the greater design diversity this vast market allows, without its relentless emphasis on SUVs.

Volvo EM90 MPV: ‘a car with room for life’

Volvo’s chief executive Jim Rowan describes the EM90 as a premium experience that evokes domesticity and security, calling it a car that’s a ‘place to connect with your loved ones, to truly be yourself. It’s this feeling of home that inspired [the] EM90, a car with room for life.’

The EV platform certainly allows for a cavernous interior, with six full size seats – including individual airline-style seats in the second row – and a plethora of screen-based tech, including a ceiling-mounted screen and door-mounted temperature controls and displays. 

The exterior stays true to current Volvo design language, with the familiar light shapes wrapping around the angular corners front and rear. It’s the proportions that mark the most distinct change, for the EM90 is upright and, well, boxy, just like Volvos of old, with a snub-nosed bonnet and tall sides. Other elements are similarly old-fashioned, like the sliding doors that provide access to the rear seats; in the US, this fits perfectly into old school minivan culture, all school runs and soccer practice.

Volvo is pitching the EM90 as a bit more than that, not least because it’s electric. China’s rather more lenient official range test gives a generous figure of up to 738 kilometres (458 miles), but that should still translate to around twice the capability of the EX30. Of course, this is largely because there’s more space for a bigger battery (116 kWh) and although the added weight ensures performance is not the focus, the EM90 can still reach 100 km/h in around 8.3 seconds.

Like all Volvos, the new MPV offers a plethora of driver-assistance systems and bristles with cameras and radars to track the world around it. Air suspension gives a smooth ride quality, especially important when the car is serving as an upmarket limo. Twenty-one speakers are scattered around the large cabin, powered by Volvo’s audio partner Bowers & Wilkins. Rear passengers can transform the interior into a movie theatre, with lighting, sound and drop-down screen adjusted accordingly.

With its Chinese parent company keen to keep Volvo’s Scandinavian roots and ethos alive, the carmaker now sells approximately 25 per cent of its output in the country, driven by an increasingly upscale, design-led image. It’s also why Volvo’s EV focus is so pronounced: between 2016 and 2022, the share of EVs in the Chinese car market grew from 1 per cent to 19 per cent. There are also three Volvo factories in China, along with a design and R&D centre. On top of all that, platform and technology sharing across the Geely family speeds up Volvo’s ability to get new ideas to market.

Will the Volvo EM90 ever make it out west? The electric MPV market has barely got off the ground in Europe and there are few competitors, save for the Lexus LM. However, as customers realise that even electric SUVs offer relatively little extra interior space compared to their equally huge ICE antecedents, the time is ripe for a new generation of spacious, practical vehicles that are multifunctional in everyday use, not rare off-road excursions.

Volvo EM90, VolvoCars.com, VolvoCars.com.cn

The new Volvo EX30 is something of a triumph for the Swedish brand. Billed as a ‘starter EV’ by a company that thinks of itself as a pioneer in all things electric, the EX30 – of which we took a first look earlier this year – is both the smallest Volvo now on sale and an explicit disavowal of the models that made company’s name back in the 1960s and 1970s – the sturdy saloon and estate cars. 

The EX30 is a compact SUV. Before you scroll away in frustration, bear us out. It’s true that this particular genre of electric automobile is over-subscribed, but where the EX30 succeeds is in its blending of artful minimalism with no-nonsense functionalism, along with a drivetrain that is rather sportier than you might expect.

Volvo’s ongoing evolution from safety-obsessed national treasure into global EV powerhouse is driven by the benign curatorship of parent company Geely, a Chinese titan with a portfolio that also includes Polestar, Lynk & Co, Zeekr, Proton, and Lotus. Geely has honed the art of cross-platform engineering, deploying a series of tweakable EV platforms in close collaboration with various design studios to make cars that are both innovative and distinctive.

Of these brands, only Volvo and Lotus have heritage to hang on to and translate into modern market demands. That’s driven Lotus’ diversion into luxury SUVs (see the Lotus Eletre) and saloons (see the Lotus Emeya), and Volvo’s disavowal of the boxy estate car in favour of crossovers and SUVs.

The ‘little’ Volvo is given a characterful, rugged stance, with the diagonal grille now reduced to a slash across the nose. Surfaces are pronounced and creased, with the body split between dark low trim and painted panels to reduce the visual effect of height.

Inside, there’s a renewed focus on innovative materials, depending on the trim and model. These include either woven flax – seen here – for dashboard and doors or upcycled denim fibres and ground plastic waste from old UPVC window frames. Seats can be trimmed in a tailored wool blend (70 per cent of which is recycled polyester) or Nordico, a new ‘bio-attributed material partly made from Finland- and Sweden-sourced pine oil’. Carpets are 100 per cent recycled PET bottles, bodywork is 25 per cent recycled aluminium, and safety is not said to be compromised one iota.

All this dramatically cuts the carbon outlay for constructing a car, something that Volvo (along with Polestar) has been prominently and transparently promoting in its quest to lower the environmental cost of motoring. There’s still some way to go before any four-wheeled vehicle hits net zero, however; Volvo says that the ‘EX30 is designed to have the smallest lifecycle CO2 footprint of any Volvo car to date – total carbon footprint over 200,000km of driving = below 30 tonnes’.

All of this sleek but sensible material design underpins a cabin dominated by a central screen and very few physical buttons – not necessarily the first choice of the truly safety minded, who might not gel with the need to push an on-screen button to open the glove box. As in most modern cars, driving systems are there to help take up the slack and any possible attention deficit, with collision avoidance, speed warnings, and Volvo’s Pilot Assist tech for a light introduction to autonomy (still far away beyond the distant horizon).

The 12.3in screen is powered by Google, with all the company’s core functionality baked into the heart of the car. It's a slightly weird partnership – the staid and sober Swedes and the carefree, information-hungry Californians all mediated by Chinese underpinnings and money. Yet rather than the end result feeling all over the place, the EX30 keeps these disparate influences cloaked beneath a pared-back, no-nonsense sense of purpose, helped by materials innovation and a spacious interior.

It's also extremely quick. The high-end twin motor model has a 0-60mph time of 3.4 seconds – making it the fastest accelerating Volvo in history. Range is generally above average at up to 275 miles for the Single Motor Extended Range variant, and charging is fast but not ultra rapid (the fastest on offer is 10-80 per cent in just under half an hour). The EX30 steers and stops beautifully, with a fluidity and poise that’s rare in this sector. It might not be the obvious car for a driving enthusiast, but they’re unlikely to be disappointed.

Other things that caught our eye were the Harman Kardon Premium Sound system, with a home audio-style soundbar taking pride of place on the dashboard, as well a plethora of storage cubby holes scattered throughout the cabin. There’s even a ‘will it fit’ size guide located inside the rear tailgate, handy for those trips to Ikea or equivalent. 

The EX30 is currently built in Zhangjiakou, China, but plans are afoot to start production in Belgium alongside the XC40 and C40 models. Coming soon is an EX30 Cross Country variant, ensuring the survival of Volvo’s name for rugged, slightly more off-road-focused versions of its key cars.

Volvo EX30, from £33,795, Twin Motor Performance ‘Ultra’ model from £44,495, VolvoCars.com

This is Volvo’s new EX30, a fully electric compact SUV that takes the brand into the small car space for the first time in a generation. The Volvo EX30 goes hard on sustainability and accountability, taking a leaf out of sister company Polestar’s great big book of decarbonisation by setting out the facts and stats behind the shiny new metal.

Available in three different mechanical configurations (an all-wheel drive Twin Motor Performance model and rear wheel drive Single Motor and Single Motor Extended Range), the EX30 makes a virtue of its relatively small footprint. Volvo describes it as having ‘the smallest lifecycle CO2 footprint of any Volvo car to date’, calculating that over the course of 200,000km of driving, the car will produce under 30 tonnes of CO2 (including that used in its manufacture). 

Volvo (and Polestar) are ahead of the game when it comes to such calculations, even though there’s no standard metric that can be applied across the entire industry. And given that Volvo’s other products are mostly large SUVs and estates, it’s not especially surprising to find the EX30 gets the best score here. Volvo has worked hard to ramp up the recycled materials; a quarter of the aluminium used, for example, and the interior dashboard proudly bears the flecks that signify second-use plastic (in this case from discarded plastic window frames). 

The tech elements also follow Volvo’s ongoing path to simplicity. For the first time, a Volvo interior appears as pared back and minimal as the original Tesla, a choice that won’t please everyone (the company used to ensure its knobs and buttons could be operated when wearing heavy Swedish winter gloves). Key functions are duplicated on the steering wheel, but everything else goes through a Google-driven 12.3in screen. 

All this is wrapped up in a body style that’s distinctly conservative, distinguished only by the marque’s new frontal treatment (slimmer lights, no grille) and the signature kicked-up line on the rear door that meets the thick C-pillar. Short overhangs maximise internal space and there’s Volvo’s industry-leading safety systems, both in terms of the car’s physical construction and its advanced electronic systems. 

The EX30 might be small, but it’s also mighty; in Twin Motor Performance guise it dispatches the 0-60mph sprint in 3.4 seconds, making it the fastest-accelerating Volvo ever. That same model will have a range of up to 265 miles, while the Single Motor Extended Range model gets an extra 10 miles on top of that. The base Single Motor model makes do with only around 200 miles, although all three versions naturally feature fast charging.

Despite the relatively conventional exterior, the EX30 marks a sea-change in approaches to colour, materials and trim. The four design themes – Breeze, Indigo, Mist and Pine – use materials like woven flax, upcycled denim, ground plastic, blended wool, recycled plastic bottles for the carpets and a material called ‘Nordico’, made partly from Finland- and Sweden-sourced pine oil. 

The pared-back interior is not lacking in practicality, with myriad storage spaces, from dedicated phone pockets for rear passengers to a removable rear storage box and a size guide in the boot. First deliveries are due in early 2023, with a rugged EX30 Cross Country version following later in the year. 

Volvo EX30, from £33,795, Volvocars.com

When it launched the original XC90 back in 2002, Volvo started the slow process of extricating itself from its long-standing association with estate cars. A Volvo wagon has been synonymous with a certain style of no-nonsense, Western-centric conventional family life since the early 1970s, but the XC90 pointed the way towards an SUV-led future.

Volvo EX90: a fully electric SUV

This is the new Volvo EX90, the direct descendant of that debut Volvo SUV, and the first ‘90’ model to be fully electrified. In all honesty, it bears a striking resemblance to the model it replaces, the current-generation Volvo XC90, with similar stance, scale, and proportions. The difference is in the details, and – of course – the new electrified power train.

The EX90 represents several new strands to Volvo’s thinking about mobility, not least the ownership experience. For a start, you can subscribe to the car, rather than own or lease it. Managing the power and battery level is made easier by the accompanying smartphone app, and Volvo is emphasising the connectivity between your infotainment and information systems at home and on the road.

Volvo has cleverly taken some of the best bits of other manufacturers’ EV offerings and repackaged them with an environmental and wellness spin. The company is offering a bi-directional wall box that can receive power from the car as well as charge it, ensuring you make the most of every last kilowatt (available in certain markets only).

Perhaps surprisingly, the Swedish safety specialists have gone all out on touch-screen displays, with a large portrait-orientated 15in centre screen that offers up an impressive spread of Google navigation and entertainment. It’s paired with a smaller display behind the steering wheel for vital driving information.

The Bowers & Wilkins audio system includes a 25-speaker Dolby Atmos-equipped stereo, and there’s the ability to use your phone as a car key. Integration with Google Home is also included, allowing you to use your digital assistant to find out battery charge, or heat or cool the car using your voice.

The sheer scale of the EX90 allows for a big battery pack with a c600km range. Safety is subtly integrated but more all-seeing than ever before, with cameras, radars and lidar powered by Nvidia Drive to keep a constant electronic eye on the world around you. Volvo claims the system can see small objects ‘hundreds of metres ahead’, while also monitoring the driver’s concentration levels and even bring the car to a safe stop if you should nod off behind the wheel.

This large SUV also gives Volvo an opportunity to use as much recycled material as possible – 15 per cent of the steel is recycled, as is 25 per cent of the aluminium, alongside nearly 50kg of recycled plastics.

Externally, the EX90 continues the minimal visual trend of recent Volvos, most especially the electric C40 Recharge with the diagonal-slash radiator grille now an abstract shape in the centre of a bluff, smooth front end. Even the ‘shoulder’ detail at the D-pillar has been pared back; there’s no longer a ribbon of taillights integrating the glasshouse with the main body of the car.

A large panoramic glass roof brings light into the spacious seven-seater interior, with the option of non-leather upholstery part of Volvo’s commitment to extracting every last drop of sustainable credibility out of its suppliers. 

The upper end of the EV market just got a new challenger.  

Volvo EX90, price tbc, volvocars.com

The idea of venturing to Valdres, a remote valley four hours north of Oslo in an EV was nerve-wracking. Where would we charge? How would we charge? What would happen if we broke down in the Norwegian woods? My companion Maija Astikainen, a photographer from Helsinki, was equally anxious.

She drives a VW Transporter that she has converted into a camper van. It runs on biogas and in Finland, she can fill up everywhere. In London, I drive a Volvo XC60 hybrid and outside my house is a charging point that is usually either broken (Camden Council, take note) or being hogged by a non-EV.

My worries, the Polestar team reassure me, are because I’m British. In 2021, 65 per cent of all cars sold in Norway were electric. As a result, there would be charge points everywhere. Of course, we had our own set of cables in the bonnet should we need them, and we could always call Polestar's new Norwegian head office, Polestar Space Oslo, if things got really bad.

The first of many Polestar Spaces to be opened around the world, the Oslo Space takes the same minimalist, anti-auto establishment route as that set by the company's sleek HQ building in Gothenburg, designed by Swedish architects Bornstein Lyckefors. 

Our ride was the Polestar 2, the second car built by Sweden’s newest car company. The Polestar 2’s interior looks faintly familiar, with similar knobs and handles and graphics to my Volvo. (Polestar is owned by Volvo and Geely, a group based in China, where the EVs are made.)

But that’s where comparisons end; Polestar 2 has vegan upholstery, and frameless mirrors that dim bright lights in the dark. It feels cool to drive in comparison to the old-fashioned frumpy cousin that is my own school-run carry-all. I open the door by running my hands along a metallic strip and Maija adjusts her seat straight upwards a bit, to give more of a ‘van perspective’.  

We feel like Thelma and Louise racing into the unknown, families left in our (non-existent) exhaust fumes. Then we pull up the GPS. Oslo to Vang (our stopover point) is a round trip of 453km; there are four charging stations along our route. By clicking on them, we can see how much battery we will have by the time we get to each.

We decide to stop when the battery is on 30 per cent, so that if the charging point is busy or doesn’t work, there’s another further along the route within our charge range. We feel smug that we have a back-up plan.

Maija drives first, as the Norwegians and Finns travel on the same side of the road and the traffic around Oslo is heavy. Before long, we’re soaked in scenery so stunning it’s hard to look at the road. Semi-frozen lakes shimmer in the spring sunshine and dense pine forests are capped in shade; the Polestar hums quietly along without disturbing the peace.

The car can accelerate from 0-100 km/h in just five seconds and we put it to the test as we overtake a tractor on a straight bit. It’s easy to cruise at 90km/h without noticing – until we remember that a traffic fine in Norway can be upwards of 700 euros. And that’s before points. 

Our first stop is at Hallingby, a cluster of newish houses built along the main road. It has a Kiwi supermarket and a Recharge charging station with two empty charge points. There’s not a car in sight, just a few people out on their porches enjoying the sun.

We pull up and plug in, tap a key fob onto the screen, which debits payment from our account, and choose the right kind of plug (CCS). We stroll along to the regular gas station to grab a coffee while we charge and after half an hour, the battery is at 90 per cent.  

Our final destination for the day is Lerhol Farm outside Vang. Our host Knut Lerhol has given us directions: ‘Take the E16 for 3.5 hours. Right at the bridge with yellow railings, pass a sign for the Riddarstøga Museum, a big stone and a huge waterfall, where you drive down to our farm. Good luck!’ 

We pass several wrong stones and wrong waterfalls, but luckily the Polestar is nifty at three-point turns on mountain switchbacks, even with summer tyres. We pull up at the farm next to a tractor and Lerhol’s dog Kvikk skips over and urinates against the 20in forged aluminium wheels. Lerhol’s family has owned 50,000 acres in Vang since 1647, over 16 generations. They also own the Riddarstøga Museum, which holds 15 vintage tractors and items from a Norwegian mountain farm from the last 100 years. 

The museum is open by appointment, but it’s not the reason we are here. Lerhol rents out a summer cabin and a sauna called Eldmølla, which he built with the aid of architecture students from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology – structures that will ultimately appear in a book Maija and I are writing about modern sauna culture.

We need to go 3km up a snowy track to reach them, and the best way is by foot, the way Lerhol’s ancestors have always done it, only they were herding the cows. When we get there, we steam in the sauna, jump into the waterfall beneath it to cool off and have a picnic in the cabin where Lerhol’s family spend every July and August. ‘The goal when I take over the farm is to live off tourism and milk production,’ he explains over a cheese sandwich made from bread baked by his sauna collaborator Hallgrim Rogn.

Before we head back to Oslo, we charge near Vang at the (empty) Tesla Supercharger station. Vang has a population of around 2,000 and at least four electric charging stations, all built within the last five years. ‘Only about 30 per cent of people in Vang have an electric car,’ says Lerhol. ‘It’s a slow take-up because of the climate and topography. You often need a 4x4.’

The Polestar 2 certainly suited our needs. And our journey both ways cost NOK290 (£24) and would have been far less if we had been able to charge at home. 

What I initially saw as the future is fast becoming an everyday reality. Norway has decreed that sales of all new cars and vans shall be zero-emission by 2025. Polestar is one of the manufacturers that will make this possible. The company is committed to creating Project 0, a fully climate-neutral EV, by 2030, a goal that will mean bringing production back from China and removing all greenhouse gas emissions from the supply chain and end of life.

Meanwhile, the forthcoming Polestar 3 and 4 models will be electric SUVs – a good option for the people of Vang, perhaps – with the Polestar 5, due in 2024, reportedly based on the elegant Polestar Precept concept.

Helping keep emissions down will be Norwegian aluminium and renewable energy company Hydro, which uses electricity powered by waterfalls, just like the one we swam in – Hydro’s collaboration with Polestar, e-bike maker Cake, and designer Konstantin Grcic was ushered into being by Wallpaper* in 2020.

Zero emissions is one thing, but climate neutrality is a loftier goal and a far harder trail to follow. Polestar looks set to be lighting the way.

INFORMATION

Polestar 2, from £41,900, polestar.com

Norsk Hydro, hydro.com

Maija Astikainen, maijaastikainen.com

To book Eldmølla and the summer cabin, contact @badstufolk and @Knut_lerhol, eldmølla.no

The Volvo C40 is the Swedish manufacturer’s first electric-only model. This crossover-style SUV features a characteristic sloping rear roofline to distinguish it from its more conventional XC40 sibling. Crossovers are currently all the rage, as buyers desert regular MPV-style cars in their droves in favour of the ever-evolving SUV body style.

Part psychology, part image, the crossover is fast emerging as the acceptable face of big-car design, blending a spacious cabin with elevated ride height and relatively svelte looks.

In all honesty, there’s not a lot here that differentiates the C40 from the XC40, save for that different silhouette.

Under the skin there’s a choice of two models, the Recharge and Recharge Twin. The latter has dual electric motors for all-wheel-drive and a corresponding bump in power. The 75KW battery offers a maximum range of 274 miles, although real-world constraints and complexities will knock 10 – 20 per cent or more off that. This puts the C40 firmly into the EV hinterland, where range anxiety still lurks at the corners of the mind.

This wouldn’t matter so much if the car was smaller and more suited to urban use. As it is, the C40 has aspirations to be a no-nonsense Swedish grand tourer, with practicality and power that’s undermined by the battery capacity.

As we said, this is Volvo’s first all-electric car. What it is not, is a purpose-built EV, which accounts for stylistic anachronisms that hark back to Volvo’s functional but ageing design language. That also makes it heavier and not as aerodynamic (or as well packaged) as a car designed from the ground up to take electric power.

There are still plenty of fine Volvo touches, such as a leather-free interior and the ability to subscribe, not buy, the car. If you chose the latter, there’s an option to swap out for a different car, as well as have all service and maintenance taken care of. This points the way to a future model of car ownership, one that Volvo hopes to pioneer.

There have been some fine visions of tomorrow coming out of Gothenburg in recent years, like the 360c Autonomous Concept, all of which imply that Volvo still has much more to give. The C40 might not be a groundbreaker, but it is the start of a journey worth following.

INFORMATION

Volvo C40 Recharge, from £47,100, subscription from £669/month

volvocars.com

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

Volvo is in a good place right now. The Swedish company has made two bold gambles in the past decade; staking a claim on a different kind of car ownership model and a high-profile disavowal of two qualities that have underpinned high-end cars for decades, performance and dynamics. In other words, a Volvo is not a sporting car (although the company can have its cake and eat it, because performance is certainly in the domain of its very successful Polestar sub-brand). As a result, Volvo is now free to phase out the internal combustion engine, ramp up safety and innovation and get us all thinking about our cars in a very different way. 

We recently drove the new XC40 Recharge, Volvo’s first and newest pure EV, an electrified version of the fine XC40 SUV. We also had a conversation with Robin Page, Volvo Cars’ Head of Design, and his team, about the C40, the XC40’s more coupe-like, compact sibling, due on sale before the end of the year.  The XC40 is an extremely decent first effort, even when finished in a shade of pistachio that only exists in the fever dreams of Seventies cultists. Simply styled and well proportioned, it demonstrates that Volvo’s chunky aesthetics is seamlessly suited to the modern SUV, even though the car bizarrely feels a bit bigger than it looks when on the road.

True to the company’s new ethos, the XC40 eschews such fripperies as adaptable suspension or ‘sports’ mode, or even any other driving modes whatsoever. Instead, it is all about simplicity: just get in and go. With the key in your pocket, there isn’t even a ‘start’ button to push. Most strikingly, the XC40 does away with a conventional, highly visible range indicator and by default shows you only the percentage of battery you have left. This is presumably clever psychology, a way of doing away with range anxiety. If your trips are mostly short, it mostly works; on long journeys it’s a different matter. A week in the XC40 laid bare the ongoing frustrations with the UK’s charging infrastructure. Put simply, there are still nowhere near enough charging stations. Now that the majority of new EVs can accept fast charging (a minimum of 22Kw per hour), there’s no excuse to build new slow ones, yet the vast majority of chargers will still only charge your car at a trickle.

The XC40 is a great electric car that will only get better as the infrastructure catches up. Its new sibling, the C40, shares many components but has a sleeker body style. It’s also a bit more ambitious inside. According to Page, and his colleagues T. Jon Mayer, Senior Director, Exterior Design, and Lisa Reeves, Head of Interior Design, the C40 represents a transitional phase. ‘The front face, for example, because we no longer need a grill, can be closed so the front of the car has a cleaner design language,’ says Mayer, ‘Of course, we will still keep our iconic ‘hammer’ lights and the ‘iron mark’ diagonal logo.’ Aerodynamics is also a key consideration. ‘They’re so much more important on an electric vehicle. We now have aerodynamic experts in the design department, because the biggest impacts come from their involvement at the very start of the process.’

Page and his team acknowledge that ‘the benefits of electrification are really suited to Volvo’s philosophy.’ The combination of interior focus, innovation, clean, Scandinavian-inspired design, and safety can all be foregrounded by the move to EVs. Volvo is currently involved in more initiatives than most companies manage in a decade. These include a plan to de-carbonise the entire supply chain, as well as a commitment to ethically sourced materials, including ‘vegan’ interiors that are leather-free, as seen first on the C40 Recharge. The C40 also includes interior trim panels partly made from recycled plastic, with carpet formed out of recycled PET plastic bottles. All this is set against a backdrop of sales growth, which is especially remarkable given the state of the world’s auto industry after more than 18 months of pandemic. 

Good as the XC40 and C40 are, you can tell Volvo’s design team is champing at the bit to be let loose on a pure EV platform. A sample of the company’s forthcoming products can be seen in the new Concept Recharge. Previewing the next generation of Volvo’s fully electric cars, the production version of the Concept Recharge will be the first Volvo SUV on a pure electric platform, with completely flat floors and much expanded interior space. While the coach doors and individual business class-style seats might not make it to the showroom, all new Volvos will share this concept’s minimalist approach. Page describes it as ‘less but better,’ from the pared back front logo through to the Scandi-style living room interior. There’s also a place on the roof for next generation LiDAR sensors, part of Volvo’s relentless emphasis on safety. The future is coming fast down the road, and Volvo will be there to meet it.

INFORMATION

Volvo XC40, from £38,350

Volvo C40, price tbc 

volvocars.com

Pictured top, Pininfarina Battista (around $2m). Pitched as Italy’s ‘most powerful ever sports car’, the Battista packs 1,900hp of battery power within its sleek frame. Go easy, and you’ll get a 280-mile range. pininfarina.com. Pictured bottom, Rivian R1T Truck (available in 2020). Boasting a 400-mile range, the Rivian Truck (also joined by a new SUV) is an all-American utility vehicle hoping to bring rugged, go-anywhere chic to the EV market. rivian.com. 

As of this month, you’ll be able to put down a deposit on a brand new Volkswagen ID, a Golf-sized all-electric vehicle that comes pre-loaded with a weight of expectations. The car itself won’t be shown to the public until this September’s Frankfurt Motor Show, and this sight-unseen marketing strategy is hitherto unknown for a volume car manufacturer. Two things have changed the automotive landscape in the past decade. The first is the unpredictable combination of aspiration, ego, innovation and bottomless funds that has driven the American manufacturer Tesla to the forefront of the industry. The second is the fallout from the Volkswagen emissions scandal, a corporate cluster-bomb that had the unintended consequence of vastly accelerating change by killing off the very fuel it was trying to promote.

Electric vehicles (EVs) are now all the rage. At this year’s Geneva Motor Show, EVs were thick on the ground, from high-end sports cars to compact city runarounds, over-styled crossovers, outlandish luxury SUVs and conventional family cars. Almost overnight, the EV market has blossomed to fill every niche. For the industry, the shift to EVs is a no-brainer; brands will flourish under a system that promotes zero-emission driving. Over a century’s worth of automotive heritage will simply shift gear to accommodate a new generation of car buyers. For governments, cities and the public, the answer isn’t so clear. Tax revenues from fuel sales look set to plummet, while congestion and auto-centric urban design will persist.

Pictured top, Citroën Ami One (concept only). Citroën’s Ami One is a nod to the French firm’s innovative small city cars of the mid 20th-century. The two-seater is aimed squarely at the urban market. citroen.com. Pictured bottom, Polestar 2 (from €59,900). An all-electric fastback design, the Polestar 2 promises a new approach to car ownership, with seamless digital integration and smart minimal design. polestar.com.

For aspirant carmakers, this shift seemed an opportunity. Building an auto brand from scratch is a colossal undertaking, but EVs have lowered the barrier to entry, with shared platforms and far lower start-up costs. Where Tesla led, others followed. The clean-slate approach of new names such as Lynk & Co, Byton, Nio, Faraday Future and the revived Fisker brand, or even the secretive Dyson project, suddenly all seemed to have a place at the table. That window of opportunity may be narrowing, though.

Volkswagen has dug deep into its corporate pockets and set about reinventing itself as an electric powerhouse. By 2028, it promises 70 new electric models across its various brands; it claims it will be a CO2-neutral company by 2050. Other manufacturers are also taking stock. In 2017 Volvo was first to announce that all its new cars launched from 2019 would be hybrids (either ‘mild’ or ‘plug-in’) or entirely electric, with 50 per cent of its fleet being pure electric by 2025. Honda also recently committed to the total electrification of its European sales output by 2025. Porsche (a Volkswagen subsidiary) is making a massive push, bringing the sleek Taycan saloon to market later this year, with other EVs to follow. Other makers are adopting the strategy of electrifying small cars and keeping hybrid tech for larger vehicles.

For many car owners, the EV is still an unknown. Big name support might bring confidence, but other companies are resorting to another tactic: pure temptation. Electric vehicles represent a new design opportunity in an image-obsessed industry. BMW’s i division debuted in 2013 with two defiantly distinctive models, the i3 and the i8. Jaguar’s i-Pace is the style-obsessed manufacturer’s most glamorous and desirable car, while debut EVs from Audi, Mercedes, Mini, Hyundai and Kia all major heavily on design. Honda is bringing out a chic little city car in 2020, previewed by the delightful e Prototype, while other quirky urban electrics include Quadro’s eQooder (bolstered by a collaboration with Tod’s), Citroën’s Ami One, Seat’s Minimó and Fiat’s Concept Centoventi (a rather late entry for a company with gold-star heritage in the urban sector). Brands such as Polestar and Lynk & Co (both owned by Chinese manufacturer Geely, which also owns Volvo) combine contemporary design with new ownership models, reasoning that future drivers might not need to have 24-hour access or responsibility for their own vehicle.

Other start-ups are going further still to bring EVs into every conceivable niche. Rivian is hoping to create an ‘electric adventure vehicle’ sector. The American company’s R1S SUV and R1T pick-up truck are due on the road towards the end of next year and boast a 400-mile range (‘San Francisco to Yosemite and back’). Rivian’s vice president of vehicle design, Jeff Hammoud, describes an emphasis on design from the outset. ‘The first thing we paid attention to is the proportion,’ he says, explaining that the company’s EV platform (which it may license out) allows for a plethora of body styles and functions. Branding is also consciously different. ‘Trucks have grilles to communicate strength and power – they tend to be very big. We don’t need a grille, but we have kept everything intelligent and blunt. That identity also has to scale into the future.’

Hammoud describes Rivian’s style as a ‘Patagonia jacket, not an Armani suit’, emphasising the brand’s inherent functionalism. The rebirth of Lagonda, on the other hand, is pitched at the consumer of luxury attire. Part of Aston Martin since 1947, Lagonda resurfaces in 2021 with an SUV, previewed at Geneva by the All-Terrain Concept. Purely electric from the outset, the target is the Rolls-Royce market and the ethos is contemporary luxury, underpinned by cutting-edge craft, materials and tech. ‘We aim to reimagine luxury travel in a way that could only be done in the 21st century,’ says Gerhard Fourie, Aston Martin Lagonda’s director of marketing and brand strategy. ‘We don’t see luxury and technology at opposing sides of the spectrum; together they can create wonderful experiences.’ Luxury buyers seem keen to embrace the new. ‘We obviously get the strongest reaction from customers who are open to change,’ Fourie admits. ‘They have strong views on design and quite a healthy relationship with the technology in their lives – I’d say they are “technology enabled” rather than “technology obsessed”.’

Pictured top, Lagonda All-Terrain Concept car (available 2021). Lagonda’s All-Terrain Concept will hit the market in 2021 as the first luxury electric SUV. The British brand, revived in 2018 by Aston Martin, is majoring on design and quality. lagonda.com. Pictured bottom, Honda e Prototype (available 2019). Inspired by the original Honda Civic, this prototype previews Honda’s ultra-compact city car, a neat four-door with retro styling, a chic interior and, of course, zero emissions. honda.com

Also at the high end you have the Pininfarina Battista, an electric hypercar that’s out to steal the super-rich away from their Ferraris. ‘If we want to do justice to the brand we have to start where people perceive us,’ says Automobili Pininfarina’s CEO Michael Perschke, who describes the 89-year-old design house as the ‘Château Lafite of car design’. The Battista – named after the brand’s founder, Battista ‘Pinin’ Farina – is intended to be the ‘most powerful Italian sports car ever made’. With a motor in each wheel, the car will have a scarcely credible 1,900hp (over 25 per cent more than its conventionally powered rival, the Bugatti Chiron). ‘The design is a balance between radical technology and timeless Pininfarina design,’ says Perschke. ‘We want people to fall in love with an electric car for the first time.’

For well over a century, the motor car has been a totem of identity as much as a mode of transport, embedded for better or worse within society and culture. The success of all these cars depends on the premise that the automobile is here to stay, yet calls to curb or cut out car use are given increasingly serious consideration. Early EV adopters might have already reaped all the available rewards, sucking up the rebates, subsidies, free parking spots and absence of tolls. The other as yet unanswered question is that of charging. Although manufacturers are helping new networks seed across the road system, what’s really needed is a top-down overhaul of park and charge infrastructure, from city streets to supermarkets. That’s a whole different story. What’s certain is that for a time at least we’ll have more cars, not fewer, as EVs blur the lines between concept and reality and find new ways of seducing the drivers of the future. 

As originally featured in the June 2019 issue of Wallpaper* (W*243)

‘The future is not something that just happens – it is something you create,’ offers Marten Levenstam. ‘It is about the freedom to move in sustainable ways. It is about finding different modes of movement for different people’. Volvo Cars' senior vice president for product strategy talks passionately about the future. The Volvo 360c concept car we are about to see represents a grand vision. It is at once a self-driving office offering hot-desking on the move, as well as a social hub with food and champagne, relaxing imagery and moody music. Or it can be a tranquil bedroom-on-wheels – upper-class air travel on land.

This latest research vehicle represents the final stage of autonomous cars when we begin moving around in zero-emission driverless connected vehicles, and as Volvo sees it, in complete safety. This is the carmaker who in 1959 invented the three-point seat belt and the marque remains human-centric (or person-centric) in its approach to product development and design.

The 360c is fundamentally about researching the safety solutions that'll be required when our cars no longer have a human pilot, or when they (the cars) need to speak to one another and to pedestrians. Volvo safety engineers are looking into new forms of seat belts for when we no longer are obliged to sit in stillness in rows of two or three looking at the road ahead, for when we have the freedom to move around our vehicles, sit in multiple ways, dance, recline and sleep.

The ideas presented today are not necessarily pioneering – BMW and Audi have been at the forefront of setting the initial scene for the autonomous future. What makes 360c especially exciting is how Volvo is using the concept as a channel for dialogue with other car companies, policy makers and governments to help find real answers, safety solutions, and a universal language for autonomous driving communication.

Perhaps most intriguingly, the 360c has its gaze on airlines, for Volvo believes there is a viable business plan that could disrupt short distance air travel. In scenario three, the 360c operates as a single-person autonomous vehicle that can pick you up from your home, offer you food and drink that has been pre-ordered on your app, lets you recline and relax, watch a movie, sleep, wash up in the morning and be at your final destination with little of the stress of air travel. The company sees its idea, what it calls ‘road planes’, as something it could potentially sell or lease out to airlines. Experiencing the journey, albeit in virtual reality, suggests an interesting alternative to premium travel for distances that can be covered overnight.

In terms of design, the 360c does not attempt to be extraordinary. Instead the Gothenburg team led by Robin Page have focused on what happens inside this architectural bubble encased in a sweeping glass dome. That is not to say it doesn’t look fresh and futuristic. Page feels the design doesn’t sway too far from Volvo’s mainstream cars as it retains that Scandinavian cleanliness. His approach here though was more akin to product design. ‘The four-spec wheel design, typically difficult to do, works with the architectural feel of this car,' he says.

The cabin is equally devoid of drama. The space has been left clean and clear, the colour codes neutral, for the three scenarios to unfold. Page explains how his team went for natural materials, mainly linen and wool mixes for the upholstery to conjure up the feeling of a living room, office and bedroom. There is also a fair degree of sustainable and recycled materials utilised here including float wood sourced from a nearby lake, treated to automotive standards and placed on the floor area. A special safety blanket has been envisaged to cocoon the passenger inside the sleeper hub. Still in development stage, it is likely to include restraining systems that sense the shape and size of the body to work in similar ways to the current three-point safety belt but with more flexibility.

Communication is also a key area in this concept. A dedicated team has been studying kinemics – body language codes, or how humans around the world interact with other road users. These are then mimicked through light, sound and motion which are transmitted through an LED belt that wraps around the car. Volvo feels there needs to be a universal standard for autonomous communication that is easily followed by all road users in all societies and adopted by all car companies.

Elsewhere, Volvo is exploring the idea of ‘disappearing technology', keeping all the complex ‘techie' parts tucked away out of sight. The message here is that Volvo will continue to be a human-centric marque; sister brand Polestar will make cars for those who are excited by extreme technology.

The 360c opens up a broad discussion about the potential for autonomous driving technology to fundamentally change society. ‘The idea is you select what you need on an app and a clean and personalised vehicle arrives at your door, picks you up, drops you off and then disappears,’ explains Page. ‘The office may be the only one you would want to have ownership of; the others will be more like a hotel room where you hand over your keys at the end of the day.’ This is luxury, according to Volvo.

This image of mobility in the next five to ten years is at once innovative and utopian. The marque is working on some more egalitarian concepts, following on from its venture with Uber. Levenstam says he is disappointed with the negative dialogue around future transport. ‘We already have autonomous drive, artificial intelligence and the general infrastructure to do this,’ he explains. ‘Fully autonomous drive has the potential to fundamentally change our society in many ways. It is about the freedom to move. It will have a profound impact on how people travel, how we design our cities and how we use infrastructure. But we are just one of many stakeholders, so we expect and invite a broad discussion as society learns how to make the most of this revolutionary technology. We see the 360c as a conversation starter, with more ideas and answers to come as we learn more.’

INFORMATION
For more information, visit the Volvo website

May was a busy month in the automobile industry, with marques far and wide launching refreshed models from well-loved lines, as well as especially eye-catching one-off releases. Stylish saloons, stoic SUVs, nimble urban navigators and stealthy supercars captured our attention at Wallpaper* – explore our selection of the best releases of the month, and be sure to read our full features for in-depth reviews.

Ferrari SP38

Another rabbit pulled from the Ferrari hat, the Special Project 38 (joining the marque’s One-Off division) is something genuinely unique – built to order with close collaboration with a dedicated customer. The Ferraristi will recognise the basic proportions of the company’s mid-engined flagship 488 GTB, with a bodywork inspired by the legendary F40 model and hints of earlier models such as the snubby 1970s GT4. Intended for both road and track, the SP38 will most likely find itself an impressive investment, a project bringing a loyal customer to the heart of the brand whilst adding another chapter to Ferrari’s ever expanding design history.

Volvo XC40

Explicitly positioned as a ‘designer object’, Volvo XC40 is relatively compact, undeniably trim and a very pleasant place to sit. A beautifully tailored interface is fast and intuitive, akin to those found in its larger siblings the XC60 and XC90. The bodywork is a little more expressive, featuring a chunky, blade-like D-pillar that kicks up from the backdoor and dovetails into Volvo’s signature arrow-like rear lights. Volvo imbues its decades-long heritage into the XC40, values of safety, solidarity and stoic simplicity, all of which it lives up to.

Bentley Continental GT

Bentley Continental GT has sold over 65,000 units since 2003. For the latest model, engineers were still tweaking the gearbox right up until the last minute, illustrating the amount of time invested into making the new model just right. Exterior proportions bring to mind the best in Italian and French car design from the 60s and 70s, whereas inside, technology and tradition meet at tactile switches and dials, metals and woods. Whilst throttle response and steering isn’t razor sharp, the available power and unflusterable balance make it delightful to push, with a top speed of 207 mph and reaching 0 – to 60 in around 3.6 seconds.

Volkswagen Up GTI

VW continues to excel at building small cars in an age where SUVs, saloons and supercars are all the rage. Small, light and peppy, VW Up is a piece of near-perfect packaging, with 115 PS eked out of a 1 litre 3-cylinder engine, a six speed gearbox, powerful hi-fi and heated seats. On the flip side, the Up does away with the touchscreen, reasoning that you’d rather use your smartphone in place of an integrated system (however, VW need to update their phone cradle so it takes the current generation of smartphones). Amazingly economical, the Up delivers a purist experience, and is the embodiment of old school fun.

Audi RS4 Avant

The new Audi RS4 demonstrates that the attraction of stealth performance is still undiminished. Joining the RS branch of the Audi family tree (reserved for ‘racing sport’ models), the latest RS4 features a twin turbo-charged V6 engine, making it a relentlessly quick and efficient machine, with extremely fast handling and power delivery best deployed for lightning-fast overtaking manouevers. Sufficient refinement makes everyday use a pleasure and not a grinding chore – some owners will seek out every opportunity to put the car through its paces on the track, whereas for others, it’s the knowledge that absolute power is available in such a convincing and capable package.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit our Cars tagpage

Are cars getting smaller? All evidence points to the contrary. Most city dweller would agree that the metal carapaces that whizz around the modern metropolis are getting bigger and bigger. For reasons of raw economics and naked desire, the car type that has defined the century to date is the SUV, a vehicle that is by its very nature bigger and more brutish than a ‘conventional’ car. So can this high-riding attitude be successfully transplanted into a smaller package?

Most manufacturers seem to think so. Buoyed by the success of the Nissan Juke, a gawky-looking vehicle from 2010, a rash of ‘design-led’ subcompact crossover SUVs has flooded onto the market, explicitly aimed at young, urban buyers. While the original SUVs vied with themselves for scale and presence, the compact SUV market is racing to improve quality, with ‘design’ being used as tempting bait to lure in the kind of buyer who considers themselves deserving of more than a humble hatchback.

Volvo’s XC40 is the latest car to enter the fray. Explicitly positioned as a ‘designer object’, even down to the little rubber Swedish flag that pokes out from between the body panels like a clothing tag, the XC40 is relatively compact, undeniably trim and very pleasant place to sit. In the space of a few short years, Volvo has leapfrogged to the top tier of car interior design, snapping at the heels of previously unassailable companies like Audi. The XC40 has a similar touchscreen set up to its larger siblings the XC60 and XC90, and it’s a beautifully tailored interface that is fast and intuitive. The bodywork is a little more expressive than we’ve come to expect from these sober Swedes, with a chunky, blade-like D-pillar that kicks up from the back door and dovetails into Volvo’s signature arrow-like rear lights.

The XC40 is currently advertised by spots that dutifully fulfil all the tropes of the genre by showing the driver escaping the complexity and chaos of the modern city. But behind this familiar idealism Volvo is hard at work changing the way cars and bought and used. With the new Care by Volvo service, the dark arts of car ownership are distilled into something as simple as a mobile phone contract. The package varies from territory to territory, but in the US, for example, a high-spec XC40 can be had for $700 a month, with all servicing and insurance thrown in, plus the option to borrow other kinds of Volvos for up to 14 days a year.

While the XC40 is perfectly pleasant to drive, it’s also relatively conventional in this debut form. The platform beneath it, however, needs to do a lot. Volvo is owned by Geely sits on their Compact Modular Architecture platform, a chunk of engineering that will also be common to the first products by Lynk & Co, Geely’s new start-up brand.

Volvo’s decades-long heritage imbues the XC40 with some pretty solid values, all of which it lives up to – safety, solidity, stoic simplicity. The company’s safety heritage in particular changed the entire industry’s approach. Almost a year ago, Volvo stole another march on its competitors by announcing it would only produce electric and hybrid vehicles from 2019; other manufacturers scrambled to follow suit. And if enough people eschew convention and start treating their cars like upgradeable gadgets, Volvo could once again be at the cutting edge of how we use our cars.

INFORMATION
Volvo XC40, from £27,905. First Edition with option as tested, £40,055. For more information, visit the Volvo website

With this autumn’s unveiling of the all-new Volvo XC40, the Swedish manufacturer has finally completed the SUV family it started way back in 2002 with the original XC90. In recent years, following the marque’s acquisition by Chinese manufacturer Geely in 2009 (and subsequent investment), the company has rediscovered its design mojo, and with it a greater purpose, with a mission statement that sets it apart from the competition. Back in July, Volvo stole a march on the industry by announcing it would only build electric or hybridised cars from 2019 onwards. It was a move calculated to raise eyebrows and kick-start debate, and other car makers quickly followed suit.

Volvo’s recent good fortune has happened under the watch of Thomas Ingenlath, the company’s Senior Vice President of Design. Joining Volvo after over two decades at the VW Group, the German designer set about rationalising the brand, overhauling the range and rediscovering Volvo’s USP. ‘Our mission was to position Volvo amongst the premium design brands, with Scandinavian flair,’ Ingenlath tells us, ‘when I started we analysed where Volvo was going. Our positioning was great, but none of it came through in our products. We’d been claiming [Scandinavian heritage] for so long but people hadn’t been experiencing it.’

The first fruit of the revamp was the XC90, the company’s ‘full-size SUV’. Launched to great acclaim in 2014, it was followed earlier this year by the XC60, an adeptly scaled down version with five seats, rather than seven. In terms of tech, appointments, styling and usability, both cars are remarkably similar, with the slightly smaller model having an edge in terms of elegance. ‘Without any doubt, the car now gives you an aura of great Scandinavian design,’ Ingenlath concludes. And it’s true – there is an undeniably grown-edge to the interior and systems, with a graphically sophisticated touch screen, unflashy interface design and a solidity of material and structure.

Volvo set off down its current ideological path by admitting that it couldn’t compete with German and British rivals in terms of driveability and dynamics. But hey, it concluded, we’ll all be driven by our cars before too long, and the snarling, fume spewing internal combustion engine is on a one-way street towards social purgatory. Instead, the company announced it was focusing on comfort, technology, craft and, of course, safety, using quasi-autonomous systems to bolster their cars’ legendary solidity with a high-tech promise of avoiding trouble in the first place.

In September, Volvo finalised its SUV line-up with the all-new XC40, a ‘small’ SUV aimed at the increasingly lucrative urban market. Previewed a few months prior by the Concept 40, the XC40 ushers in a new product architecture, with bodywork that references all the key Volvo design cues, only a smaller, less imposing scale. ‘We are aiming at a different market group,’ Ingenlath admits, ‘we want to widen Volvo’s design expression.’

The elegance of the Concept 40 form, which came in both SUV and saloon variants, has been ably translated into the production car, with details that are bolder. ‘It’s a luxury to work with a five-metre car,’ the designer says, ‘so with a four-metre car you have to work differently and have strong graphical elements. We’re in a spiral of evolutionary change.’ Ingenlath freely admits that Volvo’s concepts aren’t simply ‘free style exercises with no realism’. ‘They’re always connected to technology that’s usable,’ he adds, ‘from a concept we get learning and feedback. With Concept 40 that was definitely the case. It makes us aim for the better solution.’ The XC40 also adopts the interior approach of its bigger siblings, with the massive touchscreen running Volvo’s ‘Sensus’ system to take care of entertainment, navigation and information.

To bolster the idea of the automobile transitioning from a symbol of speed and status into a high-end, high-tech appliance, Volvo has introduced the ‘Care by Volvo’ service. Debuting alongside the new XC40, the idea is essentially a slickly packaged leasing arrangement, a single monthly payment that’s modelled on smartphone ownership, together with two yearly model upgrades and all insurance, servicing and taxation incorporated (and, for some markets, a concierge and valet service too).

All three of Volvo’s SUVs are also teasers for next generation technologies, namely electric propulsion and autonomous driving. Volvo’s current generation tech is baked into each, with the ability to cruise along a gently undulating motorway with little more than a regulatory tap on the wheel to keep it alert to your presence. Volvo fervently believes autonomous cars can and will go further. ‘In our world those technologies very much go hand in hand,’ Ingenlath says, ‘we have the safety and the design story. These are not driver-focused, so autonomous drive and electrification have come very naturally for us.’

It’s a brave car company that predicts a future of self-driving, leased devices, a world away from current ownership models. Even so, Ingenlath hints that Volvo still has a few surprises to spring. ‘Our next concepts are very joyful. In a way they’re the fantasies you might have had as a young design student – but you’re now dealing with them on a professional level. A car without a steering wheel, for example,’ he reveals, adding that ‘our concept cars are perceived as realistic because we work so thoughtfully. But we won’t stop doing design studies that reach further forward. It’s an exciting time.’

INFORMATION

Volvo XC90, from £48,655; Volvo XC60, from £36,400 and Volvo XC40, from £27,905. For more information, visit the Volvo website

Twenty years ago, Volvo pulled the dust sheet off something rather unusual at the 1997 Frankfurt auto show. Raised up higher than a standard V70, with bodywork encased in black plastic cladding and the words ‘Cross Country’ written across its rear window, this was the V70XC. Perhaps unwittingly, the Swedish manufacturer had created a whole new sector in the automotive world – the crossover.

In the eyes of the critics, this new car sat awkwardly on garage forecourts, unsure of its place, yet the V70XC incorporated all the practicality of a four-wheel drive without the clumsy proportions. It could hack its way up a snow-covered mountain pass yet fly under the radar as a tasteful yet unassuming school runabout. Over the years, the V70XC’s legacy has been continued and copied by competitors, ultimately becoming one of the best-selling sectors in the market.

Two decades and a host of V70XC-inspired creations on and the latest iteration of Volvo’s family champion takes shape as the V90 Cross Country. Like the V90 estate on which it’s based, the Cross Country’s exterior styling is heavily influenced by the Concept Estate shooting brake, first seen at the 2014 Geneva motor show. ‘Designing a Volvo Cross Country is not a styling exercise, a plastic job. It is based on honest capability,’ says Thomas Ingenlath, Volvo’s chief designer and driver of the marque’s current design direction.

Setting it apart from the Momentum, Inscription and new R-design trim options is – as has become the norm – a hefty dose of body cladding, titanium front and rear skid plates and chrome inserts in the front grille. The sober but solid cabin is exceptionally well put together, in line with what Volvo’s design-conscious clientele have come to expect. The use of matte black walnut wood, cross-stitched leather set the Cross Country apart from the rest of the range, while a centrepiece 9.0” touchscreen display contains all the usual climate, entertainment and information controls. On the road, the Cross Country’s additional 65mm ride height offers a better view of the road and impressive ground clearance on a green lane, while the D5 diesel engine fades into the background on long, steady drives.

For all the Cross Country offers in terms of practicality, not all buyers will be in the market for a family-friendly soft-roader. Alongside the Cross Country stands the V90 and S90 R-Design models. Sitting at the opposite end of the performance spectrum, the R-Design caters for those with sporting prowess in mind – or, at least as much sportiness that can be gained from a sizeable family car. Alongside improved handling and performance from the choice of petrol and diesel engines, are a host of cosmetic changes including a redesigned front bumper with integrated fog lights, larger air intakes, sports seats and steering wheel.

What runs true between both models, however, is Volvo’s dedication to driver assistance technology. Like its larger SUV sister, the XC90, all variants of the V90 and S90 models can be fitted with autopilot functions that will help steer clear of danger up to speeds of 80mph. With ultimate driver assistance still confined to the pages of science fiction, Volvo’s systems are designed to aid a fully engaged driver, rather than replace them entirely.

More than just an expansion of the Swedish marque’s product suite, Volvo’s Cross Country and R-Design models demonstrate the company’s continued commitment to practicality, design and, above all, safety. As Volvo’s most accomplished variants to date, the R-Design and Cross Country carry the confidence of a company on an upward trajectory, capable of competing with the long-established German automotive aristocracy.

INFORMATION

From £34,55. For more information, visit the Volvo website

We are at the MAAG cultural centre in Zurich for the Volvo Art Session. In the former factory, dance duo Honji Wang and Sébastien Ramirez perform a captivating fusion of hip-hop, ballet and Capoeira, while a masked Ata Bozaci spraypaints a matt-white V90 in black before the urban artist theatrically peels the tape off to reveal his graffiti. All this is sound-tracked by Pablo Nouvelle’s electro-pop. These art/commerce collaborations can be a mixed affair, but here in Zurich’s edgier corner (the former industrial and railway backlands) it somehow seems to work.

Volvo would like to explore the marque’s potential through creative projects like this. Brand perception remains focused on the company's reputation as the maker of safe family cars and although this isn’t a bad thing, especially at a time when the car is being increasingly demonised, Volvo still wants to be seen as thoroughly modern and international.

This second personality, we’re told, is still rooted in the marque’s Scandinavian heritage while also reflecting a more modern Sweden, a country's that’s technical, connected, advanced. It also tells the story of the company’s evolution under its Chinese multinational owners Geely. This means focusing as much on design and engineering as on connectivity, electrification and autonomous driving.

Volvo will still do things differently to its German premium car rivals. Here the focus will be on exposing the more human side of digitalisation, on utilising technology as a way of taking the stress out of life. Much in the way that Tesla has carved a space in the crowded auto market with its unique products – a marque a Volvo spokesperson admits has been hugely inspirational – here the company will own a place too, with its compelling narrative that is centred on the wellbeing of its occupants. In other words, the expression of safety in the modern driving world.

Earlier in the evening we saw the V90 Cross Country concept debut at MAAG. For the leader in estate cars, this crossover car seems like a natural product, for it is an estate that can get its tyres dirty thanks to a flexible chassis built on a new platform and one that will help develop the upcoming V60 and V90 cars. The car will head to production in November and foresee the replacement of Volvo’s entire family of eight models, with the aim of delivering 800,000 cars globally by 2020.

The V90 Cross Country is a welcome return to a more confident Volvo of formal simplicity on the exterior, and a homely cabin offering a democratic space where all occupants are treated equally in contrast to the severely driver-focused seating position offered by other premium marques.

‘Our exterior design language is based around purity,’ offers the design director Thomas Ingenlath. ‘Like all great design this starts with strong proportions, which we express as cleanly as possible with large surfaces that aren’t overloaded with fussy details or fancy tricks.’

The car cabin on display features natural flame birchwood, ‘pearl’ hand-stitching on the soft nappa leather seats, accents of shiny chrome with jewel-like textured diamond-cut controls, a 19-speaker Bowers & Wilkins sound system, and an easily-understood, fully-interactive digital interface.

Ingenlath continues: ‘Our latest S90, V90 and XC90 interiors express a very modern take on digitalisation, with fewer buttons so you don’t feel like you’re on a flight deck. All our designs start with the human, so the use of natural materials combines with intuitive technologies to create a welcoming environment. Like the best consumer electronics, our digital spaces should enhance your life... not feel alien.’

Earlier in the evening we caught up with Anna Rynvall, Volvo’s young head of interaction design. ‘We have to respond to new ways of mobility, understand the mind-set of the millennial and new ways of car ownership, as well as automated driving,’ she says urgently, noting her team has grown in numbers and importance substantially in the last few years. ‘We need to offer something else to these customers.’

Volvo offers a number of innovative apps including Volvo On Call, that allows you to configure the car settings from your home; and in Sweden an in-car Deliveroo of sorts called Roam Delivery, a digital key that allows you to pre-order your groceries and have them delivered to your car boot remotely.

The company is exploring the autonomous future through the Concept 26 prototype, and all 90 series cars can be ordered with Pilot Assist to be driven semi-autonomously in certain road conditions. Then there is Drive Me, a pilot driverless project with the XC90 in Gothenburg and a similar project, we’re told, is planned later in London.

Rynvall and her team are assessing the role of the interior space in the age of autonomous driving when piloting the car is no longer the primary function. ‘Should this become more of an analogue world rather than digital,’ she notes, ‘a space where they can shut down from work, the outside world.’

We ask Ingenlath how he sees the marque approach design in the context of the sustainable driverless car of the future. ‘Our human-centric approach means that if a user scenario changes this will be reflected in the final outcome – that scenario would reflect a new starting point. This is the way Volvo will stand apart from other brands.’

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Volvo website

Barely six months after its launch, and the new Volvo XC90 continues to pick up auto show awards, most of them rewarding the Swedish manufacturer's ongoing commitment to safety. In that respect, Volvo's newest model upholds a company tradition, burnishing the long-held perception that the brand makes some of the safest cars on the road.

Get behind the wheel of this titanic and very solid-feeling SUV and you have little doubt you're in safe hand should your own somehow let you down, but there are also other factors at play. The XC90's arrival was well heralded and long overdue. Volvo can lay some claim to inventing the full-size family SUV with the original model, opening the floodgates to a market sector that now dominates the sales charts. But whilst the rivals that came after busied themselves with translating their brand attributes to this new genre of vehicles, Volvo has been largely unburdened by the need to create SUVs that are ultimate driving machines or the embodiment of contemporary luxury.

The company has ploughed a very individual furrow since it built its first cars in 1927 and although fortunes and ownership has been varied, it has stuck to its guns as a purveyor of sober, pragmatic and safe automobiles, agnostically distinct from traditionally automotive brand attributes. Since its acquisition by the Chinese conglomerate Geely in 2010, there's been a generous injection of cash to refresh the entire range and catapult Volvo into a new era.

The XC90 spearheads this technological assault. The car it replaced was well loved, sold well but was long in the tooth, so a new model was first on Geely's to-do list. Big and handsome, the XC90 is light years ahead of its predecessor in terms of dynamics, driver feedback and cabin ambience. The latter is focused on an enormous portrait-shaped touch screen, one of the best-ever automotive integrations of the technology with a genuinely intuitive interface.

Technology is Volvo’s new secret weapon. With an image shaped by safety and sober, elegant design, and an inner core of Scandinavian individuality and eccentricity, the company has quietly pushed an agenda that diminishes the totemic qualities of driving dynamics in favour of integrated, automated safety systems.

In many respects, the XC90 is a Trojan horse for driverless cars. Volvo has already designated a section of Swedish highway to trial their systems and has also stepped up and said it’ll take liability for any accidents deemed to have been caused by its cars. Right now, the XC90’s safety systems will slow and stop the car in the event of an imminent collision, as well as gently steer itself to keep you within the white lines. Volvo is far from unique in providing these abilities, but by self-consciously disassociating the act of ‘driving’ from the benefits of travelling in a car it is prepping the way for a future when we’ll hopefully trust Volvo to keep us in safe hands.

Over the next few years, Volvo will push further and further into this relatively uncharted world, although the sensor-laden snouts of its competitors are snapping at its bumpers. The new S90, due later this year, will be even more laden with tech, while the recent Concept 26 interior showcased a transformable Volvo of the future, with unfolding screens, reclining seats and a cabin that reconfigures itself to accommodate new ways of occupying yourself as the car drives itself. Last year’s ‘Excellence Concept’ also hinted at a new generation of interior design, taking aim at the 'private-jet-on-land' ambience currently dominated by high-end German limousines. Volvo has also announced the integration of Apple CarPlay into the XC90, a seamless way of bringing iPhone functionality to its own big screen.

With the XC90 and soon the S90 Volvo will be swimming in status-infested waters. Nevertheless, it believes fervently that our hang-ups over driving dynamics, sporting abilities and motorsport heritage are all going to undergo a pretty fundamental shift over the next couple of generations. By the time Volvo celebrates the centenary of its first production car in 2027, the automotive landscape might have shifted definitively in its favour. 

INFORMATION

For more information, visit Volvo’s website

Volvo combines a passion for perfecting the underlying oily mechanicals of a car with an admirably crisp, direct and no-nonsense approach to design. Even the pragmatic way their range is configured - S60, XC60, V60, V70, XC70, etc. – makes perfect sense once you understand the nomenclature. 'S' for saloon, 'V' for versatile, 'XC' for cross-country/SUV. Volvo has also steered a steadfast course between the perils of slavish retro imitation and the dangers of ditching your heritage completely; this is first and foremost a Swedish company (albeit one now backed with Chinese money, rather than American) and the country's culture runs deep.

The V40 is the latest version of what's now the smallest Volvo you can buy – what the industry calls the 'premium compact hatchback'. From the outset, you're struck with the impression of a beautifully thought out, utterly functional yet also highly likeable thing. Sure, other carmakers operate in the same sector, many of them selling orders of magnitude more than Volvo. But whereas its competitors struggle to combine character with competence, the V40 manages both with ease.

The spec sheet doesn't make for exciting reading – a 5-cylinder turbo diesel with 150bhp – but it's a sprightly drive, aided by a cabin-full of sophisticated tech, including radar-controlled cruise control, automated parallel parking, extremely easy-to-use Satnav and phone pairing, and DAB radio. That's all packaged up extremely effectively, inside and out, where Volvo's 'R-Design' trim subtly enhances the well-detailed bodywork.

Volvo is looking to bolster its design credentials, and cars like the V40 provide a pretty solid place to start. If you're not after a large vehicle – and an all-new XC90 is due late in 2014 – then the V40 is surefooted, swift enough, works beautifully and dovetails seamlessly into everyday life. Function needn't be dull, and good design that doesn't need to scream and shout is a rare find indeed.

In recent years, the application of the magic 'D' word has seen plenty of grand claims in the name of corporate reinvention, with volume car makers liberally applying broad brush 'design' to help their cars reference high-end consumer goods and bolster references to heritage. On a superficial level, it works just fine; many people are still happy to pay a premium for a 'designer' product.

Volvo wants to do things differently. This is the new Volvo Concept Coupé, billed as everything a traditional concept car should be and then a little bit extra. On the surface - and a finely detailed surface it is - the VCC is a showcase of the car designer's art, inside and out. But underneath sits a core piece of technology, the product platform that will eventually form the basis of every future Volvo. Dubbed SPA - Scalable Product Architecture - the platform is a modular way of combining engines and chassis to create practically any size or scale of vehicle.

While future plans might encompass an elegant coupé like this, the priority right now is the replacement of the venerable XC90, one of the first premium SUVs in the market but now well over a decade old. When the new generation XC90 arrives next year, the shapes and signatures you see before you will help give the high-riding four-door a more elegant, svelte and - hopefully - Swedish appearance.

Volvo is a company on a mission. After a tricky start to the 21st century the company was acquired by Geely in 2010 in a deal that gave the Chinese car-maker access to Volvo's legendary safety expertise in return for renewed investment in a brand that Sweden holds especially dear. The unspoken desire is for Volvo to square up to BMW, Audi and Mercedes, three companies that have carefully stage-managed their 'ownership' of modern, progressive car design and charge a premium as a result. The ongoing German success story is cemented by platform engineering that has sent the car market fragment into vastly expanded product lines. Volvo currently has nine distinct variations of its model line up: BMW has 32.

A new product platform will go some way to shifting the balance of power, but it will be nothing without a coherent design strategy to put on top. Last year, Volvo appointed Thomas Ingenlath as Senior Vice President of Design, a high level post that follows other car companies' decisions to bring design into the boardroom. Ingenlath, a German designer with a long career at VW man, knows full well that car design is a point of contact with the consumer, not just the car owner. Platforms, markets, corporate culture - all these things are opaque to the new car buyer. Instead, they want differentiation, something that volume car makers struggle to assert in a crowded market.

As a result, Volvo has spent a while wrangling with its mission statement, at the core of which is an echo of co-founders Assar Gabrielsson and Gustav Larson's assertion that 'cars are driven by people' and hence safety should be paramount. Volvo will always own safety, it's the kind of sticky brand association that will persist to the end of time. But the company also wants its own take on Scandinavian design culture, mindful that consumers' visual literacy and design awareness is markedly different in today's image-driven culture.

The Volvo Concept Coupé is the first of three concepts from the Gothenburg-based design studios, all of which are intended to showcase different elements of SPA. Ingenlath is refreshingly dismissive of certain trends in contemporary car design - complex, busy surfacing, the fetishism of 'dynamic' forms - as well as being adamant that to be 'Scandinavian' isn't about cutting and pasting from the mid-century modern clipboard. Instead, he talks of the social and progressive values of the region's design culture, an outdoor lifestyle that values community and cohesive, persistent values but which is also tinged with a certain romantic melancholy.

These are difficult things to translate into car design. The VCC succeed instantly as a statement of intent thanks to its note perfect proportions. The relationship between flank and shoulder, bonnet and grill and roof and tail are all characterised by simple, straightforward junctions, soft lines that still have a strong geometry. The boxy Volvos of old are there in spirit, if not in actual shape, what Ingenlath calls 'a modern squarishness.'

The company is happy to draw parallels with its classic P1800, the svelte, chrome-laden two-door car that debuted in 1961 and still has a sizeable cult following. It's true that several elements of the Concept Coupé reference the curves and swoops of the little 60s sports car, a design partly driven by the European fascination with American glitz and glamour. But Volvo has a long history with two door cars. The classic Amazon model from 1956 was always available in a neat two-door configuration, while in the more modern era there's been two generation of C70 and even a couple of quirky collaborations with Italian styling house Bertone, the 262C of 1977 and the 780 Coupé of 1985.

This is all a long time ago in car lore. What differentiates today's Concept Coupé from its predecessors is intention; not to build, but to design new cars in such a way that the details, proportions and forms translate effortlessly into the next generation of Volvo's production cars. The interior is also emblematic of the new direction, mainly because new Volvos will mean new dashboard architecture, centred around a large touchscreen display. Colours and materials are inspired by the sweep of rugged coastline surrounding Gothenburg, while Swedish sourced carpet and saddle leather, together with an Orrefors crystal drive selector, complete the picture of a proud, flag-waving product.

Gothenburg is Volvoville, where the company was founded in 1927 and where 11,000 workers are employed at the campus-style corporate HQ, factory and design centre. A few metres away from the Concept Coupé's unveiling, the real deal, the 2014 XC90, is receiving the finishing touches in deepest secrecy. Like the VCC, it'll be available with a plug-in hybrid drivetrain. Like the VCC, it'll feature an all-new dashboard and interface that will combine Volvo's safety know-how with its newly expressed design confidence. And hopefully like the VCC, its arrival will act as a glittering lure to draw many more buyers to this  venerable but very valuable brand.

Sustainable luxury is an increasingly common aspiration, from niche furniture design to giant automotive firms. Today's consumer not only want to admire their shiny belongings, they want to sleep soundly knowing their purchases have helped ease the pressure on natural resources, or have, at the very least, impacted to a lesser degree than the closest alternative.

The past few years have seen a huge number of hybrid and electric vehicles enter the market, a barrage of eco correctness that is increasingly hard to navigate. Now there's another entrant into the race, the Volvo V60 Plug-In Hybrid.

Volvo has spent several years patiently beavering away at their Gothenburg headquarters developing the most recent twist on the green revolution. At first glance the V60 Plug-In appears almost identical to any recent Volvo. The only noticeable change in appearance are the slightly space-age style of its low-drag 17 inch wheels; when cutting weight and upping aerodynamic drags, everything has to be taken into account, even the flow of air through an alloy wheel.

One has to delve a bit deeper into the mechanical workings of the V60 to find the real differences. The new car blends a 2.4-litre diesel engine with an electric motor to create a combined power output of 276bhp. That's impressive enough, but it also comes with startling claims of efficiency: 148mpg with emissions at just 49g/km of CO2.

The V60 gives you three driving modes, Pure, which enables the driver to run using only power from the lithium iron battery pack housed discretely beneath the ample boot compartment. Volvo places battery range at a little over 30 miles with this selection, which should be plenty for most daily city commutes). Hybrid mode initiates help from the diesel engine, increasing performance if and when required, and Power mode combines engine and battery together to produce enough drive to record a 0-62mph time of 6.9 seconds.

Volvo has openly geared itself towards the luxury family market, a market that demands safety as priority. To protect ones loved ones is paramount, but to protect pedestrians is the next area of innovation. Richard Monturo, Volvo Vice President of Global Marketing told us that the V60's sibling, the V40, is 'already all there' in terms of advanced people-watching technology. When the car senses an imminent pedestrian impact, it deploys an airbag around the windscreen area, cushioning impact from the bonnet and windscreen wiper recess - areas where most pedestrian head injuries occur.

As always with fledgling technologies, research/development costs quickly mount up and the V60 is a pricey way into the hybrid market. Currently, the V60 Plug In is being pitched at £42,000 in the UK, after the governmental £5,000 plug in car grant initiative is accounted for. So far Volvo have approved a 1,000 unit European wide production run with a view to a potential further 4-5,000 being made.

But whatever happens in terms of sales, Monturo is adamant the hybrid model will ultimately become the Volvo way. 'By 2015-2017 we plan to add a hybrid option to our entire range,' he says. 'We like to give our customers options, the hybrid being one that would benefit more than simply just the owner.' As a demonstration of eco sensitivity with style, the V60 is one of the better hybrids on the market, with the promise of more innovation to come.