and the wood finish on the side-table-cum-
centre-console can act as interfaces when
they’re not pretending to be lounge furniture,
for instance. And while there is a screen in
the dashboard, most of the media is delivered
to occupants using a projector, ensuring that
riders engaged in more analogue pursuits are
not being constantly provoked by news feeds
flashing at the periphery of their vision.Design for deep thinking
If we are to take the autonomous car seri-
ously as a workplace, these kinds of design
tactics will be key. Today’s employees already
struggle to engage in the sort of ‘deep’ think-
ing necessary to succeed in a competitive and
complex job market, to the detriment of their
own prospects and those of the exchequer.
‘Given the increasing share of the economy
dedicated to knowledge work, in which
concentrated thought is the primary driver of
value production, this decline might start to
impact large scale economic metrics,’ argues
Cal Newport, author of Deep Work: Rules for
Focused Success in a Distracted World.
So here’s an alternative vision: what if
the autonomous car was to become a refuge,
a snug cocoon in which you could conduct,
unassailed by technology, high-level problem-
solving at the beginning and end of the work-
ing day? Might this not transform both career
trajectories and gross domestic products?
Indeed, what’s perhaps most striking
about the images of BMW’s iNEXT interior is
not the LED membrane rippling beneath its
surface, but simply how it is furnished. The
considered use of form, texture, colour, natu-
ral lighting – tried-and-tested design tools- produces the sense of a highly inviting
space to sit and do... not much of anything,
apart from contemplate, maybe make a few
notes and stare out the window. If you think
it doesn’t sound like much more than what’s
available today – but in a more ergonomic
setting – you’re right. The basic difference
is that most of us aren’t passengers. Despite
years of promoting ride-share schemes and
investment in public transport, the average
car occupancy rate in the US is stubbornly
stuck at 1.7, according to the Federal Highway
Administration. It doesn’t pay to let your
mind wander if you’re the one driving, but if
you’re not, then being ensconced in an envi-
ronment that allows you to daydream is ideal.An outside angle
With all this in mind, it’s reassuring to see
a new industry taking a lead in the future of
the autonomous vehicle, one that can draw
on the decades’ worth of expertise that’s gone
into the creation of car interiors. Many were
surprised to see Space10 – Ikea’s think-tank
for future living – release a range of autono-
mous car concepts, but if consumers are to
spend an increasing amount of time in their
cars, such spaces will provide a valuable new
context for brands that produce physical
products. And while Space10 couldn’t quite
resist including a window-embedded screen
in the design of Office on Wheels, the overall
impression is one of exceptional normality.
A table is flanked by four chairs. A bookshelf
stands against one wall. It is a room furnished
to purpose and no more, just one that you can
inhabit while thundering down the motorway.
Physics might argue with the feasibility of
so much freestanding furniture on a moving
platform, but it conjures a far more compel-
ling image of the future of work than do its
counterparts, which seem to privilege pixels
over people.
Kaave Pour, managing director of
Space10, believes an oblique approach to
the subject gives Ikea’s ‘future-living lab’ an
advantage when it comes to thinking about
how autonomous driving can transform
people’s lives. ‘It’s important to ask what
technology can do and where it will take us,
but we also want to think about who we are
becoming when we use this technology,’ says
Pour. ‘It’s not our end point; we don’t produce
hardware or software or subscription ser-
vices. For us technology is simply an enabler
of a goal we want to achieve.’ Technology,
he explains, gives the team at Space10 more
freedom to think about reaching that goal ‘in
a way that’s perhaps a bit more appropriate
than others in this field’. ●‘On paper, it seems
great that I can read
email on my car’s
window, but will we
actually want it?’
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