2003 Model - Facelift CONFIRMED
16 April 2002, 12:45 AM
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http://www.drive.com.au/news/article.asp?article=http://drive.fairfax.com.au/content-new/news/general/2002/04/12/FFXLAWPXWZC.html
Subaru swaps sushi for souvlaki
By Peter Lyon
The Sydney Morning Herald
Friday April 12 2002
After several unsuccessful attempts to mirror European style, the Japanese maker has hired a Greek design guru.
The man who designed some of the world's best-looking cars has been hired to fix one of the world's ugliest.
Subaru has appointed Andreas Zapatinas, the former head of Alfa Romeo design, who also has worked for BMW and Pininfarina, Ferrari's preferred styling house.
His highlights include the award-winning Alfa Romeo 147 and the critically acclaimed Fiat Barchetta and later, Coupe.
-->> The 44-year-old Greek designer moves to Japan next month and almost immediately will start work on the all-new Impreza due in 2006.
His appointment follows a sales decline of the Subaru Impreza in several key markets since the controversial goggle-eyed model was released two years ago. When the first spy photos of the second-generation Impreza appeared, Japanese car magazines were so shocked they assumed it was an elaborate hoax.
The arival of Zapatinas coincides with a massive overhaul in Subaru's design department. The designer of the original Subaru Liberty, Kiyoshi Sugimoto, has been reinstated to help Zapatinas oversee Subaru's new, global styling direction.
A proud Subaru denies the design restructure is an admission that the Impreza did not meet expectations.
Masaru Katsurada, the former chief engineer for Liberty who is now the head of performance offshoot STi, told Drive: "These appointments are merely a natural progression in our development. We have spent the last 15 years focusing on getting our handling, performance and safety aspects just right.
"And now that we have those areas of functionality firmly grounded, we must approach our next breakthrough area, and that is of course emotional content. And by that I mean styling."
Until now, he said, Subaru penned its exteriors to match their respective models. He said Subaru's light 4WDs were designed to look "bold and chunky" to complement their off-road ruggedness.
With future design, he said, buyers could look forward to more "emotion" in greatly improved exteriors and interiors.
Katsurada pointed out that not everyone found the Impreza's styling controversial. The car is a huge hit in the US.
This is believed to be the result of two factors. Firstly, the Americans have never had a car with so much performance for such a low price ($US25,000) and, secondly, they had no previous WRX with which to compare the new model. The Impreza even won US Automobile magazine's prestigious Car of the Year award.
-->> Significantly, Subaru will launch a heavily facelifted Impreza before the end of the year. It is expected to be new from the windscreen forward. This is the biggest – and earliest – facelift in the Impreza's history.
-->> In his new role Zapatinas is expected to unveil the car although he will have had no part in its design – the facelift was signed off 18 months ago.
The designer of the current WRX, Mamoru Ishii, rebutted criticism of the goggle-eyed look of the new model when it was released two years ago.
He said he knew the car would spark a love-it-or-hate-it reaction and dismissed the original Impreza – which earned cult status – as "boring".
Subaru said Ishii, still a major player in the company's design division, was now working on a new model, details of which the maker would not disclose.
The company says that Zapatinas has not replaced Ishii but is in a more senior position. In his role as chief designer of Advanced Design – a new section in Subaru – he will be in charge of all new models in an effort to make its designs, in Subaru's words, "more palatable" for a global audience.
http://www.drive.com.au/news/article.asp?article=http://drive.fairfax.com.au/content-new/news/general/2002/04/12/FFXLAWPXWZC.html
Subaru swaps sushi for souvlaki
By Peter Lyon
The Sydney Morning Herald
Friday April 12 2002
After several unsuccessful attempts to mirror European style, the Japanese maker has hired a Greek design guru.
The man who designed some of the world's best-looking cars has been hired to fix one of the world's ugliest.
Subaru has appointed Andreas Zapatinas, the former head of Alfa Romeo design, who also has worked for BMW and Pininfarina, Ferrari's preferred styling house.
His highlights include the award-winning Alfa Romeo 147 and the critically acclaimed Fiat Barchetta and later, Coupe.
-->> The 44-year-old Greek designer moves to Japan next month and almost immediately will start work on the all-new Impreza due in 2006.
His appointment follows a sales decline of the Subaru Impreza in several key markets since the controversial goggle-eyed model was released two years ago. When the first spy photos of the second-generation Impreza appeared, Japanese car magazines were so shocked they assumed it was an elaborate hoax.
The arival of Zapatinas coincides with a massive overhaul in Subaru's design department. The designer of the original Subaru Liberty, Kiyoshi Sugimoto, has been reinstated to help Zapatinas oversee Subaru's new, global styling direction.
A proud Subaru denies the design restructure is an admission that the Impreza did not meet expectations.
Masaru Katsurada, the former chief engineer for Liberty who is now the head of performance offshoot STi, told Drive: "These appointments are merely a natural progression in our development. We have spent the last 15 years focusing on getting our handling, performance and safety aspects just right.
"And now that we have those areas of functionality firmly grounded, we must approach our next breakthrough area, and that is of course emotional content. And by that I mean styling."
Until now, he said, Subaru penned its exteriors to match their respective models. He said Subaru's light 4WDs were designed to look "bold and chunky" to complement their off-road ruggedness.
With future design, he said, buyers could look forward to more "emotion" in greatly improved exteriors and interiors.
Katsurada pointed out that not everyone found the Impreza's styling controversial. The car is a huge hit in the US.
This is believed to be the result of two factors. Firstly, the Americans have never had a car with so much performance for such a low price ($US25,000) and, secondly, they had no previous WRX with which to compare the new model. The Impreza even won US Automobile magazine's prestigious Car of the Year award.
-->> Significantly, Subaru will launch a heavily facelifted Impreza before the end of the year. It is expected to be new from the windscreen forward. This is the biggest – and earliest – facelift in the Impreza's history.
-->> In his new role Zapatinas is expected to unveil the car although he will have had no part in its design – the facelift was signed off 18 months ago.
The designer of the current WRX, Mamoru Ishii, rebutted criticism of the goggle-eyed look of the new model when it was released two years ago.
He said he knew the car would spark a love-it-or-hate-it reaction and dismissed the original Impreza – which earned cult status – as "boring".
Subaru said Ishii, still a major player in the company's design division, was now working on a new model, details of which the maker would not disclose.
The company says that Zapatinas has not replaced Ishii but is in a more senior position. In his role as chief designer of Advanced Design – a new section in Subaru – he will be in charge of all new models in an effort to make its designs, in Subaru's words, "more palatable" for a global audience.
16 April 2002, 01:57 AM
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16 April 2002, 06:27 AM
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Thank Goodness, I wasnt sure about the ugly duckling STI7 now I will wait & see, hopefully not too long, either that or now the truth is out the cost of STI 7 should fall & secondhand will be even cheaper thus drastic surgery will be affordable.
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