I have been discussing the importance of the interior design in autonomous vehicles for five years. Part of that was to think up eventual design decisions that come up when consequently applying focus and reduction to the essence of what is needed in a smart room on smart wheels – the term used by Neil Cybart and a few others when describing the closest metaphor to future self-driving cars.

Initially, I followed the pipe dream that an interior could basically consist of anything imaginable – once the square room that I and others envisioned will drive itself, what we can use the inside for is really up to individual needs. …

To be honest, last week’s rumors on new battery tech making all the difference in Apple Car, caught me off guard. As Reuters reports, claiming sources who saw the battery design, Apple may have groundbreaking new ways to design an EV key component.

It surprised me because I have looked at so many angles of what Apple could bring to the table, focusing of course on design and user experience, but embarrassingly overlooked the energy question – not totally, but I missed the detail, especially when it comes to understanding what Apple could do differently than any other carmaker.

Revisiting the subject, it became clear that battery tech has for decades been something that set Apple apart, starting with iPod, iPhone, iPad and eventually all wearable and portable mobile devices. So why should it be different in the ultimate mobile devices, the car? …

Five years ago, I started writing this blog. Five days ago, I had a dream about the launch of Apple Car.

It was not what I expected. Tim Cook launched it, sure, but it was in a smaller venue, I was present (again, it was a dream), and it felt more like an internal product presentation than a big Apple event.

The car wasn’t what I expected either. It was a small two-seater in a wedge-shaped design, that looked like it had a ton of leather wrapped around its body. …

We have talked a lot about the place of Apple Car in the company’s ecosystem and about its design both inside and out. Ever new clues we have taken from consumer products you can buy to Apple’s „largest product“ – its retail stores.

And the newly opened Apple Central World in Thailand is adding to the design language we can expect for a car. Some of the materials we know have seen quite significant new applications in this architecture.

What we can take from it is maybe parts of the answer to a overarching interior question: What will the ceiling look like? …

If you take all past and current Apple products, you find that the industrial design follows three simple rules for shaping all of them.

The principle best comes to light looking at all iPod models, which over the years have gone through all stages of the three basic shapes in iPod’s design evolution.

The three main shapes to be found in the image are:

1. Extrusion with rounded corners and a sharp edge (see iPod on the left for vertical extrusion, others for horizontal extrusion).
2. Rounded corners and edge with a sharp front (see iPod on the bottom, today’s iPod touch is missing but is the perfect example). …

In Queer Eye’s season five, episode five, the Fab Five work with Abby and give her a makeover for her climate activism life.

Why not make every episode about this?

THE ULTIMATE MAKEOVER

Humankind still gets a lot of their education from TV. As much as social media is impacting this, the broad mainstream of society is still heavily impacted by what they watch on their TVs. Netflix, Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+ are still very much about bringing entertainment to the living room or bedroom in the home. …

*although I would change a few things, but I regress.

ATNMBL was design by Mike & Maaike, a San Francisco based progressive industrial design studio led by Maaike Evers and Mike Simonian. A decade ago, the two former Googlers went out to get people thinking differently about cars:

ATNMBL is a driverless concept vehicle we designed in 2009 to provoke discussions around new goals for the auto industry. The vehicle is envisioned for the year 2040 and represents an alternative approach to vehicle design and interaction.

We’re now a third of the way from 2009 to 2040, so let’s assess how much closer we came to their initial…

I’ve been long been a proponent of the idea that Design will be the one factor that will change things in the car space. That’s why I was particularly interested in the ambition of James Dyson to design and manufacture an electric car.

But everyone was disappointed, himself included.

As outstanding as the Dyson product family is, this car is not. In an exterior that looks like one of Dyson’s UK-born competing brands, none of the company’s typical design language can be found. It faces the same bland design issue all SUVs face:

Six months ago, Dyson shared on his website the reasons for abandoning the car project, but it was only now that we get to see photos of what his teams were working on. …