German Car Zone

Big hood for sure.

Yeah, it's similar to the hood on the Z3:





Looks nice in my opinion, it has an interesting shape to it.

Will this be the first uncontreversial post-E65 BMW ?

god i hope not (seriously)

That would be bizarre indeed.

Didn't the new X5 already fill that shoes?

Almost, some thought it was more of a facelift than a real new car

I think we've been in a rhythm of bona-fide uncontroversial designs since the debut of the E92.

The downside has been a lack of brutal "voila" moments that really disrupted car design norms in the post E65 era - the upside has been that all of the post E92 designs have been extremely well resolved and interior quality has been improving faster than expected.

I'm really looking forward to the E89 more than just about any other car coming down the pike right now because it's going to be a very pure look at how Chris Bangle's ambitious/reckless design agenda plays when it's reigned-in and better resolved yet still expressing itself as loud as possible. It is still the Z4 after all, so this is where BMW has carte blanche to let their design chops hang out - but this time around, I think we can expect all that energy to be in a much more balanced form.

So the question in my head is whether or not BMW can have its cake and eat it too with the E89 - I have no doubt that the line and proportions will be better than the outgoing Z4, but I'm not yet sure if it'll manage to stir the imagination and push the theatrical envelope. I'm hoping BMW can do both.

^ Agreed Osna, with the exception, of course, of the X6. I'm pretty comfortable in saying that it is one of the more controversial designs out there; it's not universally appealing, it absolutely is a culmination of function follows form and it has little economic / environmental relevance in these times of greeny-whinger mentality...

I don't see X6 as a controversial design in the same way that the E65, E60, 6er and Z4 stirred-up division and derision in their time.

The question at the core of the X6 is its packaging - not its styling details. In other words, the X6 would have split opinions no matter who was penning the design. Some people are just iffy about the idea of a coupish SUV, but the rift has nothing to do with how the thing was styled.

As for the grief of having yet another SUV on the market - it's just bad timing on BMW's part. Not like they're alone in their bad SUV timing.