BMW Lovos Concept

New Designers 2 Oct 2009

The BMW Lovos Concept is an original design study of a futuristic vehicle with an exterior body made of 260 identical movable parts which integrate air-braking and photovoltaic functions. The designer is German design student Anne Forschner from Pforzheim University.

The BMW Lovos ("Lifestyle of Voluntary Simplicity") Concept is a design study by Anne Forschner that showcases an original approach to car design.

It is based on fundamental questions: "How many parts do we use to build the exterior of vehicle? How would a car look like, if it was build by just one (recurring) piece?"

The result of an experimental research is a vehicle that is made by 260 identical, exchangeable pieces which are fixed with a hinge on a substructure.

The individual pieces are movable, which allows the surface of the vehicle to be closed – like the scales of a fish – or opened to the environment.

These pieces work like airbrakes and are also photovoltaic, following the movement of the sun when the vehicle is stationary.

The pieces of the covered wheels are also functional: as soon as the vehicle starts driving, 12 pieces per wheel change their formation and move inside, just like a turbine.

The interior is soft and warm and represents a contrast to the mechanical and technical exterior.

The project is based on a philosophical idea, which asks critical questions about the design, construction and use of road vehicles, as we know them today.

As Anne Forschner explains "Contrasts, emotion and provocation are the main themes of the design."

"The world we live in is increasingly complex and we move within multifaceted social structures, hardly noticing that we perhaps lack an overview over how products and services influence and overwhelm us.

"We rarely question these structures and continue to live and consume habitually. The car represents this world in the form of a physical object."

Lovos aims to oppose and question the familiar process of designing, building, purchasing and driving cars.

The project is a symbol for the Life Of Voluntary Simplicity and is an object that seeks to provoke the viewer to sidestep his or her embrace of pleasant conformity.