Press Pass 2006
The (Coach)Builders: Fisker Delivers Fantastic Design Under His Own Name
By Andrew Gardner; photos courtesy Fisker Coachbuild/credit Andrew Macphearson
Sep 13, 2005, 23:36 PST

All are architects of Fate,Working in these walls of Time; Some with massive deeds and great,Some with ornaments of rhyme.

Nothing useless is, or low; Each thing in its place is best;And what seems but idle show Strengthens and supports the rest.For the structure that we raise, Time is with materials filled; Our to-days and yesterdays Are the blocks with which we build.
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “The Builders”





Meet the builders.

The scene: the St. Regis hotel at Monarch Beach in Southern California. A balcony overlooking a multi-tiered façade of beautiful architecture and then nature, stepping and sloping down to the stunning blue Pacific Ocean, the sun about halfway down from noon, warming but not burning the scene. A table to the right; a modeler and designer. One of blond hair mimicking the relaxed flow of the big blue below, the other of close-cropped and balding hair. The former in jeans, the other in a sport jacket. Both relaxed, one in some contrast to the state of mind wherein he was found not quite a year earlier. The scene is symbolic, perhaps by design, perhaps by the designer’s design. It is the picture of a logo.

The two men are leaders in their field, men of experience, now (but not just) at the top of their game. Their talents have seen them around the world, and now charge them with power to direct themselves and their creation which lay poised in the courtyard in front (now behind us).

The name, if not now, soon will be legend. It’s not just on the card; it’s on the car. It’s a name linked with exciting design, with dynamic poise promising of still startling performance. It’s now a name of familiar shapes from a familiar stroke of hand, now evolving and soon the more into something unique, striking, beautiful, and elegant. And it is beauty far more than skin deep.

It is deeply beautiful because it will intelligently and elegantly and quickly change the way things are done. It’s beautiful because it represents knowing how to create, right, the first time, and about doing it faster and better than anybody else. It’s about blazing without burning, surprising without shocking, enticing and rewarding. It’s about an old idea and new ideas, it’s about doing things the old fashioned way but building better than new-fashioned builders build in new-fashioned ways.

The sun setting over the Pacific Ocean, the designer, the modeler – the builders; it’s the shape of Fisker, Henrik Fisker, the CEO of his own name and his own design, with friend, colleague, and new business partner Bernhard Koehler. Henrik and Bernhard sat down for a fun chat between guys who love cars, and who love design. The setting was perfect for such an enjoyable gathering, the weather yielding an atmosphere of relaxed but involved conversation.

Henrik began to draw up, in words and ink as he is accustomed, the beautiful shape of his new company. He left Aston Martin in January to pursue his desire to completely create his own automotive design, something amazingly beyond the very efficient experience he had at Aston Martin, and certainly a long trek from his position as a design director in Ford. Car companies, even small ones, talk about development times in years; Henrik speaks in months. He went from pen and paper to complete, driveable showcar in seven months. And it goes from zero to 60 in 3.6 seconds.

The story got more and more incredible before it all came together and made sense. The company begins with tramonto. It’s the sunset, as Italians know it. It’s our scene, almost. It’s the Fisker logo, and it’s also the Fisker car. The Tramonto is the car from the sketch released by Fisker a few weeks ago (you can see the release in our Press Pass section). The topless beauty is a fantastic automobile…it employs the latest in performance, safety and materials technology.





It introduces a brand new face at the head of a somewhat familiar beast. The grille is inspired by a photograph Henrik found online. A sunrise provided a soft orange silhouette to a nearly blacked out F/A 22 Raptor fighter jet, “it has a very boxy fuselage” Henrik relates, “and you have these two protrusions, and then it’s just the wings.” As is his custom, he took the pen from my hand, as he did a year ago when we talked about the Shelby GR-1 concept – this time I was ready for it – and he drew the outline of the jet. From picture to paper, this shape transformed into the Fisker Coachbuild grille. The grille features the two-box shape that evokes the air intakes for the Raptor’s twin engines, and it narrows sharply down on either end in a reflection of the transition of the jet’s frontal outline from body to wings. The ends protrude from the large center section like whiskers from a cat’s open mouth – let’s call them Fisker’s Whiskers, appropriate as this will be the face, reinterpretable as necessary, of Fisker’s car company.






On the car, the grille is realized in a mesh and surrounded with beautifully painted (“no orange peel,” as Bernhard eagerly pointed out) bodywork. The grille is topped by something Henrik insists on in his designs – a hood without cutlines. The Tramonto’s hood outline protrudes from the base of each A-pillar, and focuses in on the tops of the headlamps, then rolls along the top of those clear-faced units before dropping one more time for the simple front-and-center line. The sides sweep almost aggressively up and back, in a familiar Henrik flow, and create one part of the dramatic stance of the convertible. The rear wheels are set wider than the front to emphasize where the torque hits the road, but the bodywork only just barely covers most of their profile from the direction of motion; the bodywork behind the rear wheels is pulled especially tight in towards the rear, which looks again familiar but from somewhere else than the front and sidess. “If you step back here, you can see…how tight the bodywork is around the wheels…” The rear end is indeed tight and the way it curves in to the center – both when viewed from the sides and from the rear – reminds us of something Fisker, and something German.






The interior has a shape that is German yet shaped un-German, with a curvy, dual cockpit design…you could see many things which seemed familiar underneath the skin. But the skin itself was really quite fantastic. It was fresh, unfamiliar to someone used to modern automobiles, sensuous and beautiful. The ceiling, the doors, the seats, the dash…everywhere we saw stunning, gorgeous leather. The Tramonto we experienced had wonderful natural leather. To see such a material so unique within this industry, truly natural leather as opposed to the stuff used in cars today, was a joyful experience. Seeing that very authentic material simply made us smile. And it reminded us of Henrik’s attention to detail.

It was great to look at this beautiful creation. There’s only one problem with looking, however, and every kid knows this; it’s not as great as touching. Happily, this was a hands-on experience. We sat in those seats – it was incredible. It’s as if you can feel the truly natural leather even through your clothes. To say a typical leather-clad chair in a luxury car – say an A8 or S-class – is as comfortable as a $10,000 lounge chair is incorrect. Because this is what a $10,000 lounge chair feels like. This is definitive luxury. The Tramonto’s leather is not perfectly smooth like some synthetic smooth-engineered product. You can feel some slight texture if you touch it lightly enough, and this texture touches, almost tickles you, but almost too gently for your level of cognizance while you sit comfortably behind the wheel. It’s more comfortable than automotive grade leather – it’s more than just smooth and soft, and it’s hard to put your finger on exactly why, but there’s just more to it…it’s just right. And the padding underneath is simply right on. The seats feature great support all around, support which progresses to a position fully abreast of your front (ok, my skinny front, anyway), so you are just swallowed by this too firm to be plush but ever so luscious seat. Fantastic.

Truly shape and fashion these;
Leave no yawning gaps between;
Think not, because no man sees,
Such things will remain unseen.
In the elder days of Art,
Builders wrought with greatest care
Each minute and unseen part;
For the Gods see everywhere.

Back outside, we examine those body gaps after Bernhard relates the energy spent on this detail. There exists a 3 mm gap between body panels where there are moveable gaps, and 1.5 mm elsewhere. Those body panels are the finest in the industry. They are all carbon fiber, and Aluminum bits provide attractive highlights amidst the impeccable paint. The wheels are machined Aluminum, and the center caps – what seem to be a very cheap and simple thing to customize, but truly are quite the opposite as others in the field can attest – feature the Fisker logo stamped in stainless steel. Fisker Coachbuild does not allow one ounce of glass fibers to end up on their cars. They know their materials from their years of experience in the field, and they chose only the best materials for their cars. And they are absolutely committed to fine details. Fisker is built right.






Henrik could certainly talk about the Tramonto all day – and rightly so, we could go on for a while ourselves (and we will, soon). But he summed it up so simply. Fisker Coachbuild can do many things in its future; based on Henrik’s past and the fact that high-end luxury cars are the fastest growing segment in the automotive industry, this is where Fisker starts: with cars that are “tasteful, elegant, sporty…sleek, low, beautiful.” Fisker has done Aston Martin, a company which defines its cars by those powerful terms. Fisker has done BMW, a company defined by supreme driving dynamics and innovative design and ideas – this, too, is Fisker Coachbuild, more than you know right now. This is the beginning of Fisker Coachbuild. There is another car, today, and so much more to this story. You may want to hear how they can produce two completely ready to drive cars, one of them fully production ready and the other nearly so, within 7 months. You may want to hear how they will be able to have two completely new models every year, and thus have seriously fast responses to market demand. There is something very special about this company, and you will want to know what that special thing is. We have more to tell, but even more to learn as this company gets production rolling and evolving. We’re excited to see what happens, and we hope you’ll join us for the adventure – we’ll tell you more very soon.

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