No more Volvo's by Steve Mattin

Re: No more Volvo's by Steve Mattin (Triggerguy)

trigger, do a little research. try this for starters:

Volvo Cars
Horbury is best known for leading the revival of the Volvo brand during his eleven years from 1991 as Design Director. He arrived too late to influence the 1992 Volvo 850 but made an immediate impact with his 1992 Volvo ECC Concept that would influence Volvo design for years to come. He was instrumental in ditching their traditional boxy look in favour of creating and implementing a stylish new design language for the brand. This stylish new look was characterised by distinctive shoulder-lines that ran the length of the car, more curved surfaces, rounded noses, and softer, less utilitarian interiors. He contributed to many designs including the Mitsubishi Carisma related 1995 S40 and V40, the sporty 1997 Volvo C70, which was engineered in collaboration with TWR, closely followed by the 1998 S80. He also contributed to the remaining line up with the 2000 V70 estate, the 2001 S60, the 2003 XC90 SUV, and the 2004 S40 and V50. He also oversaw the 1998 facelift of the Volvo 850 series which transformed them into the Volvo S70 and V70 series. Horbury's last Volvo was the 2006 C30. Ex-Mercedes-Benz designer Steve Mattin assumed the responsibility of Design Director of Volvo in 2005.

Re: No more Volvo's by Steve Mattin (eagle2x)


I know who Horbury is. I mean things like the XC60 and new S60 were done from scratch and were not Horbury designs. The S80 and S40 were completed before Mattin arrived at Volvo.

Re: No more Volvo's by Steve Mattin (Triggerguy)


I think eagle2x means that Mattin botched the momentum behind Horbury's designs, not the designs themselves; and I agree. Rather than taking the P2 design language-the fundamentals of which are strength, elegance and beauty-and elaborating on it, Mattin was scrapping it to "increasing visual volume" while condescendingly embedding "DNA" into the very language by which he used to describe his design shifts.

I'm not saying that his shifts would have been bad for the brand-indeed his XC60 and S60 concepts seems to have both been very well received-I'm just not a big fan of where he was headed with them. I strongly disliked the XC60 concept and am relieved it's been toned down for production; I'm also aware I'm in the minority on this. I've warmed up to the S60 concept, but that's primarily due to its interior, not the exterior. I like Mattin's charge for "Scandinavian Luxury" as I don't think anyone would argue that Volvo's interiors don't need a little zest. I do look forward to seeing what the production S60 will look like.

My initial reaction was one of sadness at the fact Mattin has left given that he has lead of team to create some pretty good looking new Volvos ie the XC60 and S60 concept. Other cars under his leadership are at least the V60, V30, XC30. We'll be seeing his influence for some time! Whatever the reasons are, one need not be too worried. Remember, the design team is a large team of highly skilled people pretty much all of whom worked with Peter Horbury and Steve Mattin. Most likely someone will emerge from within those ranks to be the new design director. Peter Horbury wasn't uncontroversial either. Many people (previously) said he has ruined volvo's image by loosing the boxy designs and further some complained about the "cab forward" image of the S60/V70. Peter Horbury started at Volvo Holland and designed the 480s interior and his first whole car was the 460! There are many internal candidates but Doug Frasier or Frashier? could be good. He designed the ECC, S80 and the XC90. Plus, also worked on the XC60. Whilst initially sad, I now feel optimistic that Volvo has a very skilled design team and a new leader will soon be appointed to take Volvo onwards.

If Volvo left because he has some issue with the Chinese, clearly this story brings out some details we were suspecting ie a likely new Chinese owner.

I've been giving this some more thought. It is a shame Steve Mattin is leaving. I think he brought some interesting new ideas to Volvo design. We'll see his influence for some time to come via the V30, V60, XC30, new S40, new S60 the XC90 facelift, C70 and C30 facelift plus any other new Volvo models added for new markets etc!! Change is always controversial, Peter Horbury also got in trouble with some Volvo faithful re his move to make Volvos sporty, sexy. NB the C70 and cabriolet under his charge! However, Steve could have felt frustrated by the board not being willing to accept some more of his ideas. Maybe that frustration led him to leave? Maybe the board weren't happy with the direction or ideas he had? As senior as he was, the board are the employers and have expectations. Peter Horbury wasn't given a choice to move to Ford US. Ford moved him from Volvo. I don't think this is all doom and gloom re Volvo's future. Designers move around all the time. Volvo has been quite immune to this given Jan Wilsgards long reign from 1960s to 1993!! (maybe longer). Then Peter Horbury took over, then for 2 years the chap who designed the S40 exterior was chief (before moving to Electrolux). Then Mattin took charge in 2004. His Merc background concerned some people, esp the possible similarity of the Xc60 to current Merc designs. No worry though, plenty of gifted designers at Volvo to take over.

Re Volvo's future just two notes. No one is saying BMW is finished because Bangle is leaving. Further, Mercedes got themselves into their current mess with unreliable, poorly tested designs all-by-themselves! No new owner dictated that they cut R&D and testing budgets. They messed up independently!!!!