Detroit • The role of the “concept” show car.

Invariably outrageously sculpted, the concept car was intended to wow audiences into an automaker’s display area so they might then be tempted into one of the company’s less striking but eminently more practical production automobiles. Jet cars, motorcycles with car engines, phantasmagorical off-roaders with gun turrets and not even a hint of on-road practicality were all rendered with the same final destination — the museum or the scrap heap.

The concept is just for display purposes, still others looking for public acceptance so that their backers will develop the testicular fortitude to produce them and still others that are concept in name only, the only difference between them and what will hit showroom floors in a few months being the location of the badge and the colour of the inlays in their alloy wheels. Chevrolet introduced the “virtual” concept car , two whose final styling it plans to palm off on the social media network as some sort of mass-market focus group trial by Internet.The concept car must thrill show goers, professionals and consumers alike. But, for the ultimate in futuristic design at the Detroit auto show, the displays that cultivate the industry’s future automotive stylists, namely design schools such as the College for Creative Studies and the Lawrence Technological University. Both offer coming designers a forum to display their wares for the established automotive world to see.

Source :National Post