When you see a Porsche on the road, it’s often from behind—reason enough to put that perspective into words. Naoto Fukasawa, the renowned Japanese industrial designer, talks about the purpose of design and why the rear of a car is like the final and perfectly shaped piece of a puzzle.

As a child, I often had the task of peeling potatoes, and I could never get rid of every last trace of soil on them. No matter how hard I tried, the potatoes were always still a little dirty. But as soon as I immersed them in water, they were clean—and suddenly became sculptures that fit beautifully in my hand. That’s something I have never forgotten. Decades later, when designing a cell phone, I pictured users reaching for it in their pockets. That reminded me of my experience with potatoes, so I deliberately chose not to draw aerodynamic lines. Our hands instinctively seek edges; they want to feel textures, to play with them or use them for orientation. Cars are no different in this respect, even though we use our eyes instead of our hands to constantly trace their lines and edges. It’s our way of playing with what is beautiful.

The term “interface” used to refer to software and screens. Today, every successful product is an interface—a hinge, so to speak, between people and the environment. Cars have long had this quality, thanks to their clear purpose. As a designer, I spend my time observing our everyday lives. It’s the only way I can come up with the right results and find the forms that live in the culture, habits, memories, and histories that connect us. What I’m looking for are whimsical moments in urban life that arise as if by chance. They give me insight into human behavior. And I use them to develop products. For example, if someone doesn’t have a doorstop, they might use a rubber boot instead. This is a perfect impromptu solution—the door won’t close and the rubber will protect the wood. So why not create doorstops that look like boots? Another example: a woman stands at an intersection holding a shopping bag and an umbrella. The rain has stopped, so she leans on the umbrella and hangs the bag on the umbrella’s handle, but it slips off. That gave me the idea of making an umbrella with a groove in its handle. People carry solutions like these around with them all the time without giving them a thought. That’s why they often tell me they’ve seen my designs somewhere before. They haven’t, of course; I tell them they’ve just rediscovered them in my work.

Once, I saw a girl sitting on a fallen tree trunk, utterly absorbed in reading a book. I thought to myself, “Wow! If this girl can be so comfortable, I should design a bench that looks like a tree trunk.” And this piece of furniture was indeed a success—although not as much as my CD player for the Muji company. It hangs on the wall like a ventilation system. You turn it on by pulling a cord. The CD spins like the blades of a fan, but emits music instead of air. That’s a perfect interface. The design blends into our world of experience, playing with associations like a clock, a shoelace, and a fan. It’s humorous and, of course, functional.

If you spend too much time too close to an object, you won’t see its context and won’t come up with a practical solution. I’m not the type of product designer who starts by sitting down at a table and sketching, who plays with shapes, surfaces, and colors in an attempt to create the best possible result—divorced from the outside world and oblivious to its connections. If you work like this, you’re not really in the world. Imagine a puzzle: you’ve got a hundred individual parts that represent the product’s environment. But the last piece is missing: the product itself. If you study all of the pieces of the puzzle, you’ll eventually find a shape that fits in perfectly with all of the others. But if you ignore all of the others while you sketch the last fragment, how can it possibly fit into the overall picture? The harmony would be destroyed. Something similar happens with a sports car. Its purpose is acceleration, which is why all of its lines reflect its form and come together at the rear. A Porsche and its characteristic contours yield a rear that is as natural as the last piece of a puzzle fitting perfectly into the overall picture. The front of a car might be its face—but the rear determines its character.

Naoto Fukasawa

Naoto Fukasawa (61) is one of the world’s most sought-after industrial and product designers. Toasters, refrigerators, lamps, cell phones, folding chairs—there is hardly an object of everyday life that has not been reinterpreted by this Japanese designer. “People want to touch things,” he says. “With their hands and with their eyes, constantly.”

This approach, which is the basis for all of Fukasawa’s designs, has won him more than fifty awards. He sees himself not as an artist who shapes objects, but rather as a designer who shapes interfaces—who influences that which lies between people, objects, and their environment. He is a professor at Tama Art University (approximately twelve and a half miles southwest of Tokyo) and is a prominent presence every year at the Salone del Mobile furniture fair in Milan. His design office advises companies throughout the world.

Michael Mauer, the director of Style Porsche and head of Volkswagen Group Design, contributes to the dialogue on the Porsche portfolio with Naoto Fukasawa—one of the leading lights of Japanese product and industrial design—by sketching out his take on the aesthetics of rear views from Zuffenhausen.

Clarity

The Porsche 911 represents the quintessence of Porsche design. Its contours trace the concept of sports car proportions as an ideal. The interior, which tapers to the rear, accentuates the breadth of the shoulders above the rear wheels and merges at the rear. This is where you’ll find the heart of every 911—the engine. And it is precisely here that form and function become one. Clear, broad, and forceful. Each new generation reveals the next stage in its evolution. Sharp, sporty, and timeless.

Reduction

Racing reduced to its clearest form. The spirit of the legendary Porsche 718 RS lives again in the Porsche 718 Boxster S. A mid-engine sports car with both precision on the road and precisely defined visuals. The rear is clear and unequivocal. Striking and self-assured. The 3-D construction of the taillights gives the lamps unusual depth. A powerful appearance without a trace of reserve. The rear of the 718 Boxster S is the embodiment of consistent sportiness.

Aesthetics

The Macan: both a compact SUV and a sports car. Plenty of space, but no compromises. And featuring the classic rear of a Porsche sports car with a streamlined roof and muscular shoulders above the wheels. An homage to the 911. The Macan’s typical sports-car contours—the Porsche flyline—are characteristic as well, with the roofline descending strongly to the rear to ensure optimal aerodynamic excellence.

Dynamism

Dynamism and efficiency, performance and comfort—Porsche combines a sedan and a sports car in the athletic body of the Panamera 4S. The taut, astonishingly flat roofline of this four-seater recalls that of a coupe and is unmistakably a Porsche sculpture. The Panamera’s typical waist offers an additional accent, together with the precise contours of the rear—particularly distinctive in the Panamera thanks to the sharply defined lights and confident expression.

Inspiration

The Porsche 928 was a window into the future of automotive design. The visuals of the Gran Turismo hardly changed during the entire production period from 1977 to 1995. The lower edge of the windshield is an undisguised homage to the Porsche icon and sits precisely on a 911 dimension. Characteristic features of the 928’s styling include a rounded rear and pop-up headlights in an extremely flat hood. A sporty grand tourer, visionary and one of a kind. Inspiration for the decades to come.

Click here for another Porsche model with a striking rear view.

Michael Mauer

Michael Mauer (54) is the director of Style Porsche and head of Volkswagen Group Design. After finishing secondary school at Kolleg St. Blasien in Baden-Württemberg in 1981, he studied transportation design at the well-known Pforzheim University. As Porsche’s chief designer since 2004, he has overseen the contours and rear views of numerous models.

By Naoto Fukasawa
Photos by Markus Bolsinger