Chop Shopped: BMW S.X. sexes things up a notch

Dead S.X.y

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You may remember Mr. Bumbu from another amazing design study, the Lamborghini Insecta; if not, treat yourself to a few renderings in the gallery below (hint: they’re worth a minute of your time). 

 

As you can tell from looking at the S.X., Bumbu - an SPD graduate (no it’s not some Russian spy organization, it’s the Milanese Scuola Politecnica di Design) - has a bright future in the world of automotive design. 

 

Blending BMW design DNA from recent concepts and offerings (such as the current Z4’s converging profile lines) with cues from mega-star cars, the Romanian has created a concept worthy of being the next Bavarian halo car. 

 

Other than a serious helping of all-out badness (the good kind), key features of this long-nosed, low-slung coupe include “high mount brake lights . . . incorporated into the edges of the rear window” and “lateral vents located just behind the front wheels [to] provide a point of origin for the styling lines.” 

 

Looking at the lines which form those vents, we see a much more attractive attempt at the original Z4’s “Z” line; the kicker here (at least for me) is that it also creates an arrow which says, “Follow me this way.” At the front the headlights are similar to the CS concept’s, but they border a much more aggressive, pouty face. 

 

The roofline is clearly Aston Martin (from what I see, the One-77), but the major difference is that the Aston thinks it’s worth a million bucks. The S.X. concept shows people that stunning beauty could be available for a lot less (let’s say $150k-$200k).

 

While only a designer knows the true intentions and purpose of an original design, everyone seems to think this coupe would be a fitting replacement for the droopy and aged 6-Series. I feel, however, that it could play a much bigger role: that of a high-end GT to rival Aston’s DB9. Ideally packing the performance of said DB9 (any of the big BMW engines could work, whether they be the turbo V8, V10, or V12), this really could be a brand representative unlike any of BMW’s previous halo cars (the Z8 and 8-Series). 

 

Being a concept, anything you can dream up for the power lump is a possibility. That’s where the engineers come in, which means it's time for this episode of Chop Shopped to come to an end.

 

Enjoy the potential future and let BMW know what you think. Maybe if enough people send them a notice or two, they’ll stop creating monsters like the 5-Series GT and X6 and bring out a hot GT like the S.X.