Last week, we asked what the new Rivian R3 (and R3X) reminded them of, and everyone agreed that they looked like a trendy sedan from the ’80s. As it turns out, this isn’t a coincidence, according to Jeff Hammoud, the automaker’s design director.
While I personally posited that the R3X looked like a second-generation Volkswagen Golf Country, readers pointed to the Dodge Omni, Fiat Ritmo, Ford Fiesta, and more. And while those are all smart answers, Hammoud said his team was encouraged through the Group. Rally Cars B.
“The instructions I gave to the design team were: we want this to be our solo rally car,” Hammoud recently told Road.
Read: The Web Thinks Rivian’s R3X Looks Like an ’80s Hatch What does that remind you of?
Despite the strong similarities to these cars, the R3 pulls off the impressive trick of not being a copy. And it wasn’t a fluke, either, according to Hammoud, who expressed his goal of making the car look “as if it had been We are here from the long term and from the beyond at the same time. “
The new style was also expected to move the logo forward. While the R2 was only going to be a smaller edition of what the company was already doing, the R3 was going to “broaden the definition of what Rivian is” by going beyond the limitations of the classic. U. S. -sized automobiles and adopting a more globally oriented footprint. And in doing so, Hammoud said he hopes the high-performance R3X will convince even old-school enthusiasts to buy a Rivian.
“If you think about electric vehicles, it’s not a question of whether everything will go electric. It’s a matter of when. And so how can you still evoke an emotion and at the same time get other people excited about something so different?””With cars like the R3, we could convince people like us who have been in the business and are fuel enthusiasts to give it a try.