Renault Wind Design - car designer Breun on the design concept: symbiosis of coupé and roadster

Either you love him or you hate him. Or you only love him at second glance. The R enault In any case, wind is not a car that everyone will remember as a dream car. Rather, the little French is a car with rough edges. Someone who wants to provoke.

Renault Wind - A car with recognition value

At least that was in the specifications of the designers before they gave the Renault Wind breathed life into the first white sheet of paper. In a broad-based study, young people from around the world who belong to the target group of Renault Wind , asked about their wishes. The men and women between 25 and 35 expressed one wish above all: the car must be recognizable and should only be liked after a long period of viewing.

No sooner said than done. With the Renault Wind, the Renault designers developed an extroverted outsider. Wide and beefy at the front, very compact overall and a mixture of round and angular shapes at the back. A bit of everything. And that is what Renault Wind wants to be. A mix of roadster and convertible. Like Cola and Fanta. Like Spezi, the mixture should inspire new fans.

Address a young target group

'With the Renault Wind, we wanted to create a compact and sporty car with an innovative roof solution,' says Axel Breun, Design Director Concept Cars at Renault. When development began in early 2006, he was head of the design team at Renault Sport, which is responsible for development. The lines of the Renault Wind come from the pens of Yas Suzuki (exterior), who already gave the Renault Mégane Trophy a shape, and from the versatile Johann Ory (interior), who designed the Formula Renault 2.0 racing car and is addicted to motorsport.

With the design of the Renault Wind, the creatives at Renault want to appeal to a young target group. The starting point of the considerations was, for example, an Opel Tigra Twintop or a Ford Streetka. With the symbiosis of coupé and roadster, however, they wanted to create something unique. 'Something to rub against',explains Breun. 'The target group may not even think of a convertible. There are two cars in one. The closed version is a coupé, the open version a roadster.'

Folding roof as a challenge

The style-defining feature of the Renault Wind was that it should be based on a sculpture. The focus was on flowing transitions. In retrospect, Breun is particularly proud of the doors. 'I told my people, just look at the door of the Lamborghini Miura.' The biggest challenge, however, was to accommodate the roof. Since the roof structure initially rises vertically into the air when it is opened, and then disappears horizontally in one piece at the rear, the design of the rear was difficult.

The lines at the rear are actually tapered, but the roof had to be accommodated in the same length and width as it was in the rear. 'It was a real challenge to integrate the roof,' says Breun. Even if the mechanism is actually simple, the simple things often require the greatest work. But there was also a solution for Renault Wind. The long, flat area directly behind the small rear window is now framed by the sloping coupé back and a rear spoiler that merges into it. The front end, on the other hand, is a little reminiscent of the Renault Twingo.

With some similarities with the basic Renault Twingo, the Renault Wind remains a homegrown product - which you either love or hate. Or just take it to the heart late.