The New BMW 5 Series Sedan

Well, the new BMW 5 Series sedan was unveiled today, in Europe, and the results were certainly surprising. It is clear from the 5 Series unveiling that the BMW design team still doesn't have their "mojo" back, the mojo that they lost so badly under previous design chief Chris Bangle. Not only did Bangle destroy the clean, modern, highly sporting ethic that was characteristic of BMW design (and received tremendous criticism for it), but it appears that BMW is still, even now, only slowly moving on the path back to great design that characterized the mark for so many years. The 7 Series, that was released last year, seemed to be a step in the right direction. Certainly, the overall design ethic was cleaner, simpler, smoother, but there was still something somewhat ungainly about it. I think what was clearly happening with the 7 Series was that the design team attempted to remove the Bangle aesthetic from the 7 Series, cleaning it up and smoothing it out, and yet we are left with a kind of bland and bulbous car, especially around the nose and grille area, an area which previously BMWs had absolutely owned with elegant, simple, remarkably sporting design. The 7 Series isn't a bad shape. It just seems to be a transition point or halfway house for BMW along the way back to a more elegant design aesthetic. Therefore, one had great hopes for the 5 Series sedan, feeling that this would be the car that finally brought BMW right back into the heart of the game designwise. Moreover, BMW was handed a great opportunity in terms of the 5 Series design by Mercedes, who recently redesigned the E Class. The E Class turned out to be so ugly, in an attempt to merge a variety of different design cues, that it basically handed the game to BMW, and all BMW needed to do was to hit it out of the park to win this battle hands down, and yet, incredibly, failed to do so. The new 5 Series sedan isn't a bad-looking car. In fact, it is the best new BMW designwise since Bangle, but it still has some way to go before BMW redefines a new, perhaps more swoopy, graphic elegance for their models. The 5 Series essentially looks like an enlarged 3 series, with basically the same graphics, except the nose is clearly better done. In the nose area, BMW shows design movement, even from the more recent 7 Series, and they are clearly getting their act together. Also, the tail light configuration, general glass house area remains a strong point. Yet, the overall shape continues to be bland, with something missing that clearly calls for a new BMW design feel that is both postmodern and post-Bangle. Looking at the inside of the 5 Series, the interior is clearly its most successful feature. It takes all of the revisions made to the more recent BMWs, starting with the 7 Series, and takes them to a higher level. It is the epitome of clean, modern, shapely architecture. It is not sexy, like the new Jaguar XJ is inside, but it is a beautiful piece of modern sculpture which clearly reflects all the progress BMW has made recently in that area. So, there you have it. One can only hope that the design team at BMW will continue to search for a redefinition of sporting elegance, one that they owned so commandingly from the 60's to the 90's. JLS:M&M