REVIEWED BY OCTANE STAFF AND CONTRIBUTORS
Books
STEVE SAXTY, stevesaxty.com, £235 for three-volume set, £79.95 for BMW by Design only
‘It never really leaves you – even though I left BMW years ago, I still feel oddly vested in its future and quietly root for its newest car. I know I shouldn’t care so much about BMW but I still do, and I always will.’ Not a quote from author Steve Saxty (he was better known as a Ford man, in his industry days) but of a senior ex-BMW designer who remains anonymous. It’s hidden at the end of a short piece about the character of (and characters among) BMW’s design team, past and present, in one of the three books making up this impressive slipcased set. And it is tellingly candid.
Regular readers may recall that we ran an abridged version of a chapter from BMW’s Hidden Gems in Octane 248. Here you’ll see more of the same fabulous design sketches, but they’re still a mere fraction of what’s on offer. This chapter is preceded by the full story of BMW’s own re-creation of the Bertone-designed Garmisch concept, which was based on the structure of an ’02-series and involved much detective work within BMW to source such obscure elements as the correct (Fiat 130 Coupé!) headlamps and (Fiat X1/9, Dino GT4, Lancia Stratos) doorhandles. Fascinating stuff, and plenty of design sketches accompany the luxe photography.
The rest of this volume features the ‘secret life of the Z1’, a never-before-seen repacement (called ‘2K2’) for the 2002 that clearly inspired the later 1-series coupé; a chapter on detailing from badges to wheels, and another devoted to a host of concept sketches that made it no further than ink on paper. As Saxty himself writes: ‘The sparkle behind each of them deserves to be hidden no longer.’
The quote at the beginning of this review comes from the BMW Art by Design volume, a collection of artworks from several eras of BMW design, each accompanied by a quote from the artist responsible and reproduced separately in an enveloped set of art prints, all presented within a box that itself sits within the slipcase alongside the other two volumes!
Presentation is important here; paper quality is high, as are production and design values. The whole thing is a reflection of the character of the subject matter. You don’t have to go the whole hog: BMW by Design is available on its own, and is the most conventional volume of the set, being a chronological exploration of BMW’s design history (there’s even a section about BMW’s
