Renault opens design center in São Paulo to get closer to the arts
Valor Econômico - 04/10/2008
Renault decided to take the design area away from the grease environment to bring it closer to the charm of the art galleries and decoration stores of one of the most elegant districts of São Paulo. Yesterday, the assembler opened its sixth design center out of France in the Jardins district, following a new trend in the automotive industry, which starts transferring much of the product development from headquarters to emerging markets. This is the first assembler in Brazil to have the design outside the plant. The chosen place was the elegant Gabriel Monteiro da Silva avenue, in the heart of the Jardins district, which is lined with Latin America's most sophisticated furniture, art, and decoration stores, very distant from the assembly line located in the municipality of São José dos Pinhais, in the State of Paraná. The new environment will serve not only to inspire car projects for the Brazilian market, as well as to be in line with the taste of consumers from the other countries of Mercosul. For such, the team, which starts with 10 people, includes professionals from other countries, such as Argentina and Colombia. The group is small. Much smaller than Renault's main design center in France, where 12 thousand professionals work. However it has already started to work in five projects. "This charming area gathers the greatest names in architecture and interior design, who can help in the development of the automobile design culture", explained Renault's president in Mercosul, Jérôme Stoll, during a presentation in the external area of the 400 m² two-storied house. Renault made things easier so that its designers, in their daily way back from lunch, for example, become inspired by some sculpture store or arts studio. That is not all. The modernity and the bubbling atmosphere of a metropolis like São Paulo, where concepts in events such as the Fashion Week are dictated, represent, in the opinion of the Renault's managers, the right way for a company that wants to develop its future car models based on the fashion trends.