The space up! is debuting at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show.

It follows the Up! concept presented by VW at Frankfurt last September, with which it shares the design language, the rear-engine layout and a concept oriented towards minimizing dimensions and optimizing interior space.

With a total length of just 3.68 meters, the concept van is 15 centimeters shorter than the Fox, the most compact Volkswagen today.

According to Volkswagen, the upcoming production models are currently under development.

Below we report VW's official press release.

From the official Press Release:

“The world premiere of the up! at the IAA in Frankfurt served as an initial test to see how the concept of our New Small Family would be received in Europe. And the results of this test were more than favorable,” says Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg, Head of Technical Development.

Volkswagen’s chief engineer continues: “The second member of this new family now follows in the space up!. The small van shows that we are consistently exploiting every millimeter of space and creating an emotional design.”

Walter de Silva, Chief Designer of the Volkswagen Group, underscores the assessment of the board member heading development:

“In formal design terms, one can see that the space up! is fun and at the same time offers maximum space on the smallest of platforms. Our New Small Family brings a smile back to the road.

"An exceptionally amiable charisma unites the up! and the space up! now being presented in Tokyo. At the same time, it is apparent at first glance that despite all of the emotionality of this car we avoided superfluous gimmicks of any kind. This has created a very straight-lined and confident design.”

Concept

On just 3.68 meters length and 1.63 meters width, space up! offers the space of a considerably larger vehicle.

The clever space concept is to a great extent attributable to its engine layout: the gasoline, diesel and electric powertrains of the future up! family are always located in the rear – just like on the Beetle and the Bulli (Microbus) of the past.

Compared to the Up! Concept shown at Frankfurt, the space up! is 23 cm longer and 4 cm taller; its wheelbase is also larger (2.56 meter).

In contrast to the two-door up!, the space up! has four doors plus two-part rear door insead of conventional tailgate.

The loading capacity ranges from 220 to 1,005 liters. The cabin features four seats with multivariable positions.

Numerous functions are controlled via a touchscreen with 3D graphics and proximity sensors.

Exterior design

Volkswagen is introducing the space up! as the second model variant of the “New Small Family”. The up! concept car presented at the IAA in Germany and the space up! now being shown in Japan are unified by a common design philosophy.

The cars are characterized by a simple, clear language of forms. The designers consciously omitted any superfluous gimmicks. "Like the up!, the space up! is characterized by a completely new harmony between technical layout, on the one hand, and emotional design on the other."

Front end

Distinguishing the front end of the “New Small Family” are the headlamps that take an inward diagonal line, between them the horizontally integrated air inlets (minimized aperture optimizes aerodynamics), the VW logo arranged on the front hood (as the only exterior detail kept in chrome) and the smooth-surfaced bumper with a lower segment in the form of the “happy face” that is typical of Volkswagen.

A new design feature of the headlamp design is that they extend far into the fender, and this also affects the side profile.

Side profile

On its sides, the concept car – like the “Bulli” in earlier days – exhibits a long extended window section and a clearly distinctive, powerful C-pillar whose form is typical of Volkswagen.

The A-pillar is positioned far forward. The space between the A and C pillars is spanned by the line of butterfly doors with opposing hinges. Both the front and rear doors are opened by door handles at the height of the B pillars.

Since they open in opposition, in the style of the legendary Samba bus, and extend across nearly the entire space between the wheel housings – i.e. the entire sill length – all four seating positions are exceptionally convenient to access.

A key concept here is wheel housings: Hidden under them are the self-confident and large 18-inch wheels with size 165/50 tires.

Distinctive in this area are the short front and rear overhangs. The front overhang, from the axle hub to the outer skin of the bumper measures just 53 centimeters; in the rear it is 59 centimeters. The result: Crisp proportions.

Rear end

The rear end is characterized by the door that fills out practically the entire car area above the bumper. Similar to the smaller up!, the door – split 1/3 to 2/3 here – is made of transparent material.

Integrated beneath it are the taillights. Fully opened, the door offers a cargo width of 101 centimeters. The bumper itself was
designed to match its counterpart at the front end.

Thanks to the wide track width of 1.42 meters the outer edges of the wheels are in line with the wheel housings. The effect is that the entire vehicle width of 1.63 meters seems to consist of axles plus tires and wheels. Meanwhile, the only details that boldly jump outside of the vehicle width are the round-shaped outside mirrors, like the ones on the up!.

Interior design

The space up! is a full-fledged four-seater. In the rear, a bench seat is implemented with two integrated child seats.

To convert them from adult to child seats, the seating surfaces are simply folded over, and two shoulder supports are folded out on each side.

The cushions of the four seats – for driver, front and rear passengers – consist of an airflow foam that automatically adapts to individual anatomies. In addition, the seating position is high, making it extremely comfortable.

With the exception of the driver’s seat, all seats can also be folded and removed.

If the seats are “only” folded, this creates a level cargo area with a capacity of up to 1,005 liters.

With four people on board, cargo capacity up to window level height is still 220 liters.

Since the low-profile engine of the space up! is located in the rear, objects with a maximum length of 2.8 meters can be stowed in a pass-through to the front cargo space.

Interface

Since the car’s cockpit was conceived as a module to be applied across all models of the “New Small Family”, the cockpit unit was copied from the up! concept car presented in Frankfurt, with slight modifications.

In detail, the space up! has two central displays: In the cockpit, an 8-inch monitor displays information such as vehicle speed, fuel level and range as well as momentary CO2 emissions.

In the middle of the instruments a 7-inch touchscreen monitor integrates many functions and also makes use of proximity sensors which allow it to react to gestures as well, i.e. specific hand movements.

(Source: Volkswagen)