IN THE SPOTLIGHT
CARS I PEOPLE I SCOOPS I MOTORSPORT I ANALYSIS – THE MONTH ACCORDING TO CAR
Cheap and cheerful? Pah. These days, Kia excels at both electric and premium. The EV9 is its most ambitious car yet.
Remember the Sedona MPV? Kia’s come a long way since the days of the bland and forgettable family car. Or, indeed, its focus on cheap runabouts for the masses. These days, the brand has an attitude, thanks in huge part to the confidence of its design team, and has started building cars people desire, rather than need.
It’s tricky following on from the EV6 – a truly great EV that we love at CAR – but somehow, Kia’s managed to keep up its momentum. The new, all-electric, futuristic-looking EV9 is another part of that seemingly un-ending upward trajectory, launching towards the end of 2023 in Europe.
The EV9’s geometrically-inspired lines – from its flared triangular wings and chunkily wraparound windscreen, to the ‘star map’ LEDs and animated, customisable digital lighting patterns – add up to a new design approach. Much of which will filter down to its smaller electric cars, and fulfil Kia’s masterplan of having 14 EVs on sale by 2027.
Kia’s design confidence is high-lighted by the fact that the produc-tion-spec EV9 shares so much with the concept that came before it, bar the even wilder interior. The brand’s head of global design, Karim Habib, cites ‘aerodynamic reasons’ as to why the EV9 has ‘slightly less ground clearance than a normal SUV’, before admitting that making it look good has also been a huge factor.
‘I think that’s partly what makes the car, like the bonnet being shorter, the cabin longer and the beltline low. The beltline is definitely lower than on the concept car. In its glass-to-body proportion, it’s a bit less classi-cal SUV-like. That was all part of the message of this more “living space” architecture.’
Inside, the EV9 sports one large 27-inch instrument panel combining a trio of slim screens, which Kia’s global head of interiors, Jochen Paesen, says is a ‘newer generation of screens beyond the EV6, which will be rolled out across the range’. The EV9 also has a new steering wheel with a chamfered top edge to create a shallow, elongated capital ‘D’ shape to make viewing that driver display easier, while all of the key physical driver controls are clustered around the steering column to avoid greater visual clutter elsewhere.
The instrument panel, door grab handles and centre armrest – with major open storage beneath – all re-flect a ‘floating’ design aesthetic, seemingly suspended in their various locations, which Paesen says is about ‘concentrating on the negative space and shadow and as an antithesis of the over-busy interior desi
