Active design

In a fortnight, the Audi sphere group of concept vehicles will be expanded with the arrival of the fourth member, the Audi activesphere concept. Joining the skysphere, grandsphere and urbansphere concepts, the activesphere concept ‘brings two worlds together that have never been combined before’ says Audi’s Head of Design, Marc Lichte.

He describes the new concept which will be debuted internationally on January 26 as ‘a robust off-roader and an elegant, highly beautiful coupe’ and says that the new vehicle will be a marriage of contrasts and ‘promises a maximum of aesthetics and is full of contrasts – cold and warm colours, manual and automated driving mode, edgy as well as streamlined, very simple but at the same time very techie, too’.

The new concept draws on international influences for its inspiration says Lichte.

“The hotspots for trends around the world can nowadays be found in places like Beijing, China, or California in the United States. Take Malibu, for instance, which is a mecca for car culture. We have our own Audi design studios in cities like that. I always ask my team in those studios: What’s next – what’s the next big thing? Because only with a mindset like that you can create something truly new. In California, people lead a very active lifestyle: early in the morning before work they would go surfing, and on the weekend they would go to the countryside to enjoy the outdoors. 

They do that mostly in their SUV. But when they go into town for dinner, they’ll have a second car, an elegant one,” he says.

The idea of the activesphere then represents the combination of these two styles in the one vehicle. It’s very much a vehicle targeting the active lifestyle, something dear to Lichte’s heart.

An accomplished yachtsman and skier, Lichte also spends as much time as he can on his mountain and gravel bikes – spending time outdoors to balance the amount of time he spends within the confines of an office and design studio.

“Fresh air, water, feeling the elements – I love it, it’s my passion,” Lichte says. “I always demand a high level of perfection and performance from my sports equipment, but also from myself. And I have the same demand when it comes to the design of a car – it always has to be the best to date, bringing performance and aesthetics in harmony, perfect down to the last detail.”
In this case, perfection tends to the minimalist approach with what Lichte calls a ‘reduced’ design.

“It is my passion to aim for something that is timeless. For me, a reduced design is a sustainable design, quite literally. Shapes that will last for a long time.

“For the Audi activesphere concept we also had this in mind – the core of Audi’s DNA is still quattro, a drive technology we have had for decades. The design language of the Audi activesphere concept will be a testimonial to this technology. The car is very timeless, but at the same time it is also progressive and will stand out. A simple shape, reduced to the maximum, but very muscular, with soft muscles. But just like with the basic idea for the vehicle, we asked ourselves ‘what is the next level in quattro’? The answer is that quattro is not just a technology or a design element. quattro becomes an experience.”

The fundamental idea of the activesphere is one of flexibility and of lifestyle orientation.

“It will be your companion that will safely take you anywhere you want to go,” says Lichte.

“What’s more, it is super easy to accommodate any kind of sports equipment for an active lifestyle. Because the Audi activesphere concept will be highly variable, just like the other sphere concepts before that.”

“The vehicle is a 360-degree experience, 365 days a year,” Lichte continues. “In short, the Audi activesphere concept takes your adventures to the next level.”

Certainly it is an all encompassing brief and one that will be eagerly anticipated when the new sphere model is revealed to the world in a matter of weeks.