Honda Advanced Design Tokyo winner of LA design challenge

(November 24, 2014) LOS ANGELES —  Honda Advanced Design Tokyo was named the winner of the 2014 LA Auto Show Design Challenge competition, themed "Sensing the Future: How Will Cars Interact with Us in 2029?"

Honda Tokyo came out on top against four
world-renowned design studios for the prestigious honor, with its innovative and intuitive CARpet concept. Infiniti Design San Diego was also crowned the first "People's Choice Award" winner for its imaginative SYNAPTIQ design.

During a time when people have become fully autonomous, CARpet meets those needs by activating users to shape and alter the layout of the interior space in a playful manner to perfectly match needs and desires.



CARpet is an interior with a human focus consisting of two main elements: a carpet, which is highly flexible and seamlessly changes shape to a user's liking, and a ball, which allows drivers to interact during their autonomous journey. Honda's CARpet brings back the joy of travel, and through the ball the car receives driver input to determine its optimum move helping to allow drivers to simply enjoy the ride.

Themed "Sensing the Future: How Will Cars Interact With Us In 2029?" the competitors focused on automotive interiors that will comfortably and safely connect the driver and/or passengers to the car and paid special attention to various factors being judged including comfort, attention to human sense and emotional connection, ecological sensitivity, creativity of concept, control and function of concept and reflection of the brand.



Although all five participating design studios presented thought-provoking concepts, it was Honda Tokyo that best met the judging criteria on how future technology will further transform human-to-machine interfaces that connect with senses, predict our next moves and create a more humanlike relationship with our vehicles. Whether alone or with friends, CARpet interior allows travelers to create intuitive and natural forms to enjoy their ride.

"Honda Advanced Design Tokyo created a seamless, inclusive and integrated concept with CARpet that brings back the fun in family road trips," said Tom Matano, Design Challenge judge and executive director of the School of Industrial Design, Academy of Art University. "They successfully created a human-centric design solution which included the promise of technology and connectivity to make the experience for drivers enjoyable. It is truly intuitive and anticipating of what people want."

Other design studios who participated in this year's Design Challenge represented global automakers Infiniti, Acura, Qoros and Peterbilt Motors.