2019 45 | Concept Car | Design

Exterior

Inherits of PONY’s characteristic ; Simple Body structure

We announced Hyundai’s new design direction that is called "Sensuous Sportiness."

It integrates our brand spirit and creates emotional value. PONY is the start of Sensuous Sportiness, and 45’s exterior design inherits many of PONY’s characteristic parts.

By actively borrowing PONY’s simple body structure overall, one can intuitively sense that the car is highly simplistic when looking at it for the first time.

The car features a powerful, straight body volume, allowing a diamond-shaped exterior silhouette from the front and back. Through this design, a viewer can feel the car’s solid structure with freshness like a newly launched electric gadget.

Styling

With a fastback profile, ‘45’ optimizes the stable and dynamic stance typology on an EV platform. It borrows PONY’s most characteristic design - the dynamic and bold C-pillar shape - and realizes a readily forward-oriented gesture.

The car’s project name ‘45’ owes itself partly to the 45-degree angle of the slanted C-pillar. The slanted line continues down to the side doors, visually signaling the car is capable of very high power and speed.

In addition, we wanted to highlight the battery, the new power source, through the design of 45. To visibly show the battery located at the bottom of the car from the outside, with uniqueness as an EV, we applied a garnish design on the bottom part of the side doors. We stressed the battery’s existence through multiple horizontal line and tried to make the car look slimmer.

Interior

Space befitting customers’ lifestyles

45 is the concept car that Hyundai transforms into a customer’s lifestyle brand.

The interior concept of ‘45’ aspires to create a space that goes beyond a means of transportation and offers better values befitting customers’ lifestyles. The carefully designed interior space is practical for the driver and their family, which improves the time customers spend inside the car.

Living space

The interior space of ‘45’ has been designed with a focus on the vehicle’s changed role as a living space. To provide its distinctness as a living space, we took inspirations from furniture design and applied them. Ultimately, we aim to offer optimal comfort, as one finds in furnishings that are precisely located in their proper place. In terms of choosing materials, we used wood, fabric, leather in crash pads, doors and seat, to offer a warm, cozy feeling of home. For headlining, we got inspiration from the blind, using light as a material to create a warm interior ambiance.

On a basic level, the actual amount of space used has been maximized. This was done through the use of a motor and efficient location of the battery, as well as the Slim Cockpit and Slim Seat. The design of the upper crash pad, which looks like a wide shelf gently placed in the front, offers a warm and comfortable feel. Several design innovations resemble the experience of using high-end audio or electronic goods. They include dials and buttons made of simple shapes like circles, straight lines, and flat surfaces or created out of carving metal, as well as the delicate use of wooden materials and fabrics and their combinations. Through these changes, a passenger can not only expect coziness inside the car but experience convenience in entering and exiting the vehicle through the swivel seat.

Redefines storage space

The car also redefines storage space, which is an important element in the interior space of a car. We expanded the concept of the map pocket on the door trim and designed it in a horizontally elongated shape that can store books or tablet PCs. Furthermore, the part that stores goods uses a transparent material so that it is possible to see what is stored inside. By using the single-post front seat and lounge chair rear seat, the lower space beneath the seats can also be used for storage.

“Style Set Free” concept

The interior design of ‘45’ is optimized as a living space. It is expanded through the “Style Set Free” concept, which changes to customers’ diverse lifestyles. By offering diverse options for choosing different designs and materials, fitting their tastes, ‘45’s interior design will create many different combinations. For example, the seat can be structured freely to the number of passengers and use. Through these specific designs, customers can experience the perfect interior space for them.

2019 concept car 45 space befitting customers lifestyles

Technology

Lamp features

We reinterpreted PONY’s lattice radiator grille pattern as a futuristic cube lamp design. The new grille design is an evolved form of the existing two-dimensional lamps and shows a three-dimensional shape by adding a Z-axis physical movement. This demonstrates that Hyundai Motor’s light signature will develop more progressively by adding physical movement, instead of having an immobile.

Camera Mirror System

The side mirrors have been replaced by cameras in line with Hyundai’s technological development. The downside of camera-type side mirrors, which was shown by other OEMs, was that the mirrors got dirty while driving and didn’t offer clear visibility. We solved this problem by applying new technologies such as the embedded turntable module and brush.

Spoiler

For the part connecting from the C-pillar to the rear windshield, we kept the two sets of air vents, each on the left and right sides, keeping their form but changing their function to apply an active moving spoiler that assists aerodynamics depending on the drive mode.

Touchable projector

On the dashboard surface facing the passenger seat, additional information is played through a touchable projector and the passenger can touch-control the dashboard surface. Instead of a large black display occupying the dashboard's spacious screen, we resorted to using projection beams, so that the graphic information is naturally aligned with the dashboard surface made of wooden materials.