Lotus Cars Limited is a British automotive company headquartered in Norfolk, England, which manufactures sports cars and racing cars noted for their light weight and fine handling characteristics.
A concept car is a car made to showcase new styling and/or new technology. They are often exhibited at motor shows to gauge customer reaction to new and radical designs which may or may not be mass-produced. General Motors designer Harley Earl is generally credited with inventing the concept car, and did much to popularize it through its traveling Motorama shows of the 1950s.
Harley Jarvis Earl was an American automotive designer and business executive. He was the initial designated head of design at General Motors, later becoming vice president, the first top executive ever appointed in design of a major corporation in American history. He was an industrial designer and a pioneer of modern transportation design. A coachbuilder by trade, Earl pioneered the use of freeform sketching and hand sculpted clay models as automotive design techniques. He subsequently introduced the "concept car" as both a tool for the design process and a clever marketing device.
The Isuzu Piazza is a small, sporty 3-door liftback coupé which was manufactured by Isuzu from 1981 until 1992 in two generations. The Isuzu Piazza was marketed as the Isuzu Impulse in North America and as the Holden Piazza in Australia.
Wayne K. Cherry is an American car designer educated at Art Center College of Design and employed by General Motors from 1962 through 2004, retiring as Vice President of Design. Cherry worked for General Motors in the United States from 1962 until 1965, when he moved to the United Kingdom to take a position with General Motors' Vauxhall Motors subsidiary, becoming Design Director at Vauxhall in 1975. In 1983 General Motors consolidated all European passenger car design under Cherry and made him Design Director at General Motors' Adam Opel AG subsidiary. Cherry returned to the United States in 1991 and in 1992 became General Motors Vice President of Design. Cherry retired from General Motors in 2004.
The Isuzu VehiCROSS (UGS250) is a compact SUV from Isuzu. Produced from 1997 through 2001, it shares many of its components with the Trooper, including both its 3.2 L and 3.5 L V6 engine that produces 215 bhp at 5400 rpm and 230 lb⋅ft (312 N⋅m) of torque at 3000 rpm. The vehicle also features the Torque on Demand (TOD) 4-wheel-drive system produced by BorgWarner. It is a small, sporty 2-door crossover vehicle with aggressive external styling, including short overhangs, an aggressive forward stance, titanium "teeth" in the grille, a black hood-insert, and black plastic cladding over the entire lower half of the vehicle. The US VehiCROSS came equipped with 16" polished wheels in 1999 and 18" chrome wheels during the remainder of production. The Japanese version came equipped with 16" alloys with chrome center caps.
Olivier Boulay is an automobile designer. Since 2009, he has been the Vice President of Daimler's Advanced Design Centre in Beijing, China.
The Cadillac Cien is a 2-door rear mid-engined, rear-wheel-drive high performance concept car created by Cadillac, designed by Simon Cox, and unveiled at the 2002 Detroit Auto Show to celebrate Cadillac's 100th anniversary.
Joseph E. Oros Jr. was an automobile stylist for Ford Motor Company over a period of 21 years — known as the Chief Designer of the team at Ford that styled the original Mustang, and for his contributions to the 1955 Ford Thunderbird. Oros was also an artist, sculptor, painter and industrial designer, having designed appliances and other products.
Geoff Lawson was a British car designer and was Design Director for Jaguar from 1989 until his death in June 1999. He was succeeded at Jaguar by Ian Callum.
Alexander Sarantos Tremulis was a Greek-American industrial designer in the North American automotive industry. Tremulis held automotive design positions at Cord Automobile, Duesenberg, General Motors, Tucker Car Corporation and Ford Motor Company before establishing a consulting firm.
Daniel Simon is a German concept designer and automotive futurist. He is best known for his vehicle designs in movies like Tron: Legacy and Oblivion, and his book Cosmic Motors.
The Cadillac ELR is a two-door, four-passenger luxury plug-in hybrid compact coupé manufactured and marketed by Cadillac for model years (MY) 2014 and 2016 – with a hiatus for MY 2015. Using a retuned version of the Chevrolet Volt's Voltec EREV drivetrain, the ELR's lithium-ion battery pack delivers an all-electric range of 37–39 miles (60–63 km) and a top speed of 106 mph (171 km/h).
Ronald Price Hickman (1932–2011) was a South African-born, Jersey-based automobile designer and inventor. He worked for both the Ford motor company and Lotus, where he designed the original Lotus Elan, the Lotus Elan +2 and the Lotus Europa. However, he is best known for his design of a wood-working bench called the Black & Decker Workmate.
London Motor Show, formerly the London Motorfair, is a motor show in England. It was held biannually at Earls Court Exhibition Centre, from 1977 to 1999. When the event won the support of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders and P&O Events, in October 1993, the name changed from the London Motorfair to The London Motor Show.
Niki Smart is a British car designer, known for being the lead designer on the Ariel Atom project and his concept car design for Cadillac, as design manager for the General Motors Advanced Design team in Los Angeles, California.
The Isuzu 4200R is a mid-engine sports car that Isuzu displayed at the 1989 Tokyo Motor Show. The development theme was the establishment of a sporty performance and image, in a traditional European taste. Lotus and Isuzu were connected at the time, both being in the GM group, and Shirō Nakamura, who was with Isuzu at the time worked together with a designer from Lotus to create a dynamic, elegant style.
David Hilton is an American/German automotive designer working internationally.
Shiro Nakamura is a former Japanese car designer and company executive. Nakamura served as Senior Vice President of Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. From 2006, Nakamura had been Nissan's Chief Creative Officer. He was Chief Creative Officer of Nissan, Infiniti and Datsun. Nakamura retired in 2017. Known as a hands-on creative, he goes by the nickname "Fingers".
John Manoogian II is an industrial designer, adjunct faculty member, automotive industry expert and automobile designer — widely known for his nearly 33-year career with General Motors, where he designed for the company's Chevrolet, Pontiac, Saturn, Buick, Oldsmobile and Cadillac divisions.
