EV designers are seeing grilles in a whole new way

Electric vehicle designers have a new canvas on which to mark their brand image: the front end.

Since EVs don't contain hot combustion engines, they don't need the grilles that have shaped the look of autos for decades, with large air vents to cool what's behind them.

EVs present the industry with a fundamental change in design because electric motors require far less space, and batteries are placed low on a skateboard platform, leaving room for more flexible interior and exterior designs. Some of the key "hard points" that define internal combustion cars, particularly the engine compartment, are now fair game for experimentation on EVs.

The question facing automakers now is what to do with all the new design space.

Not surprisingly, they disagree.

"With reduced cooling needs, an EV's grille can be more about form than function," said Karl Brauer, a veteran auto analyst and executive analyst at iSeeCars.com. "That widens the EV designer's options, but it doesn't reduce the importance of a grille's design, as that area can still make or break an overall look.

"I've seen EVs with, essentially, no grille, and I don't think that's the smart way to go," he said. "A grille can provide both character and distinctiveness to a vehicle's appearance. The lack of any grille squanders the opportunity to enhance those areas."

The coming Tesla Cybertruck has a flat piece of unpainted metal where a grille would normally go. Besides the concept truck's geometric weirdness, the front end is too minimalistic, Brauer contends. A blend of old and new probably strikes the best note during the great EV transition.

"Cars like the Audi A6 E-tron or GMC Hummer do an effective job of merging a traditional grille with a minimalist grille design, resulting in a sleek yet engaging front-end appearance," he said.

Eventually, mimicking internal combustion designs may go away entirely. But the transition is likely to be gradual, over some years, so that consumers don't recoil from the shock of the new.

Warned Brauer: "We're not ready to give up our grilles. Yet."

The first-generation Nissan Leaf had a sloping nose, in body color, with the charge port in the middle. That look was unique but too bland for some critics. The second-generation Leaf went for a more mainstream look, employing Nissan's signature V-shaped grille.

Hyundai's first EVs in the U.S., the Ioniq hatch and Kona crossover, were based on gas counterparts, so designers simply covered the grille area with textured plastic. But the coming new generation of Hyundai EVs is more adventurous.

Tesla has projected its EV image by doing away with the idea of a grille almost entirely. The first Tesla Model S sedan did have a rounded black panel that mimicked a grille, but that was later revised in favor of a small T-shaped design also found on the Model X crossover. The Model 3 sedan and Model Y crossover have no grille but do have a notable lower air intake.

EVs do need air to cool their electric components, air conditioning and the battery, so there is often a lower air intake with slats that can open for cooling or close for better aerodynamics. Those shutters can also be employed in the grille area.

New EVs also present an opportunity to design with light to give front ends greater flare and differentiation. With super-hot internal combustion engines gone, there is less restriction of where lights can be placed. The coincidental rise of super-efficient LEDs gives designers a new palate, said Steve Lietaert, president of lighting company Hella Corporate Center USA.

"You don't need [the grille] now. You have a panel. It's a free piece of real estate," Lietaert said.

"We can contract it and bring the headlamps in more. We can add light to it. We can illuminate it. We can put a translucent logo on it. Let's make it say, 'I'm an EV.' Maybe that won't be so important in the future, but right now it is."

South Korea's largest supplier, Hyundai Mobis, shares that vision. In June, it said it had developed a "lighting grille" that will turn the entire front end of a vehicle into an integrated lighting module.

"The lighting grille can be used as a means of communicating with other vehicles or pedestrians," the company said in a press release last month, "and it can also create strong and unique design effects depending on how the lighting patterns are applied."

The new Hyundai Ioniq 5 crossover, which will be the automaker's first vehicle on a dedicated EV platform and arrives in the U.S. in the fall, has a rectangular element where a grille would normally be, but it uses pixel-shaped lighting to distinguish its look. Volkswagen also uses some lighting tricks on its ID4 electric crossover, including an illuminated VW logo on some trims.

While BMW's early entry in the EV market, the i3, has a reduced version of the automaker's signature kidney grille, the coming iX crossover has rotated the two pieces vertically and connected them to long headlights.

GMC's new Hummer EVs, which are not yet on sale, use six blocks of lights to spell out the name across the front and a large lower grille with a more traditional look. The front end of the coming F-150 Lightning looks a lot like that of its internal combustion counterpart but with a wraparound light bar.

Of course, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Tesla's snub-nose models project a modern "anti-grille" attitude as a rebuke to gasoline rivals, but that look is aging.

Some analysts and designers think the newly available real estate should be more than a blank space.

Stephanie Brinley, principal automotive analyst at IHS Markit, compares the industry's new exploration of grilles to the design challenge automakers faced to comply with bumper regulations in the mid-1970s.

"It is interesting watching the industry adapt functional changes into car design," Brinley said. "Often, the initial efforts are clumsy, but it gets stronger over time.

"What does not change in the grille transition is that it still creates a face that communicates the personality of the vehicle and still has to deliver a credible brand story. Whether that brand story includes 100 years of history or is one of new beginnings and just starting out, people need to be able to see it and identify it."

Lucid is a new EV brand with none of the design baggage of traditional automakers. Brinley sees the horizontal light bar across the front fascia of Lucid's Air sedan, along with its lower cooling vent, as futuristic and premium.

In contrast, the Mustang Mach-E electric crossover must communicate a link between Ford Motor Co.'s storied past and its bright future. Ford has chosen an oval-ish shape, done in body color, with black accents for the grille area in its mainstream versions. But the high-performance GT gets a fully blacked-out piece that is textured to simulate vent intakes.

"Ford's mission with the Mach-E is to get people comfortable with an EV," Brinley said, "as well as taking Mustang heritage into the crossover space."

Volkswagen is playing it a little safer than some with its early ID series of EVs, since its goal is to capture traditional gasoline engine crossover buyers.

"The VW ID4 face is reminiscent of the Golf and clearly a VW, even as it strives to position itself as a crossover instead of a hatchback," Brinley said.

Future VW electric vehicles, as foreshadowed by the ID Buzz microbus concept, could be a little more adventurous, given their niche status.

Nissan calls the front fascia on its coming Ariya electric crossover a "shield," full of sensors, surrounded by diagonal light bars and featuring an illuminated logo. But it still uses the traditional V-shape of Nissan's internal combustion vehicles.

Mercedes' new EQS sedan also uses front-end lighting to distinguish its image and dress up the rather plain fascia. "Upon approach, you'll notice the ultra-sleek exterior with an LED light band that stretches across the entire front grille, giving you a taste of the captivating beauty that lies within," the automaker said in promotional material.

That's promising business news for lighting suppliers such as Hella and Hyundai Mobis. For automakers and designers, it presents both an opportunity and a challenge. But the Pandora's box of new ideas has been fully opened.