BMW revolutionized mobility with Designworks in five decades

Designworks is the design innovation studio for BMW Group, a German multinational manufacturer of luxury vehicles and motorcycles headquartered in Munich.

Chuck Pelly, an American industrial designer started Designworks in 1972 in a garage in Malibu, California. It was acquired by BMW Group as its subsidiary in 1995.

As an independent studio, Designworks stimulates ambitious visions of the future through practical design strategies and explorations. It pushes future experiences that are as relevant and ambitious as possible.

Over the past 50 years, the studio has become known for making designs that are innovative and have a big impact in many different fields, such as transportation, consumer electronics, lifestyle, and health.

BMW Designworks changed from making clay models of cars to making complete mobility solutions for cities. Its new studio in Santa Monica is the biggest of the three Designworks studios around the world and according to Adrian van Hooydonk, senior vice president of BMW Group Design, it will give BMW Group brands new ideas.

“It will be used to test out innovative and environmentally friendly ways to move around in the future,” Van Hooydonk said. “The studio will help with the move from physical design and development to digital ones.”

“Our new studio gives us the freedom to use digitalization to its fullest,” Holger Hampf, head of Designworks added.

In addition to that, Designworks is known for its user-centric approach, which puts the needs and wants of the end user at the center of every design decision.

The most recent automotive project from the innovative studio is the first-ever BMW racing car with a hybrid V8 which made its debut at the 24 Hours of Daytona. It was a mix of old and new technology.

Also, Designworks made a special app for the most recent Consumer Electronics Show to go with the BMW I Vision Dee, a concept car with color-changing E Ink technology that was shown off. The app lets people make a “digital twin” of the car and project it onto any background to show what it can do in both the real world and the virtual world.

Read also: Why BMW iVision Dee is your ride to the future of luxury electric sedans

But Designworks knows a lot more than just how to make cars, and the company has used its design skills to make mobility solutions that work for the whole ecosystem of urban spaces.

Designworks has made two innovative seat studies for the BMW brand that combine sustainability with futuristic design. They are also experimenting with new ways to make things and materials that are better for the environment, such as textiles made from bacteria and without plastic.

“The studio also designed products for the USOC Paralympic teams. In 2012, Team USA won seven medals and set four Paralympian world records, according to bmwblog.com “Another interesting product launched in recent times is a flying taxi. In the latest attempt to showcase a stylish and cool flying taxi, BMW Designworks put together a project with Alaka’i Technologies.”

With the opening of its new studio in Santa Monica, Designworks is ready to make even more progress in the field of design and help come up with new, environmentally friendly ways to move around in the future. And with its commitment to sustainability and cutting-edge technology, Designworks is in a good position to keep pushing the limits in the world of design, as it has done in the past, according to BMW Group