Genesis’ Luc Donckerwolke: competition fuels strong design
Genesis’ chief creative officer speaks on his coupe and convertible concepts and beating competition – on road and racetrack
“My role is to inject adrenaline into the brand,” Luc Donckerwolke tells CDN at the reveal of his latest Genesis concept. The X Gran Equator is explored in more detail here, but seeing the covers whipped off at Genesis House in New York gave us time in front of its charismatic designer.
It’s the latest in a long line of Genesis concepts, most of which haven’t yet had a peep at being production ready. While time will tell for the Gran Equator, the green light may soon glow for the svelte, G90 saloon-based X Gran Coupe and X Gran Convertible revealed at the 2025 Seoul Mobility Show earlier in April.
“We’ve done a lot of coupes and convertibles but we realised that the brand at that moment was not ready,” Genesis’ chief creative officer admits. “Europe is still a very young market for us, but in the last ten years we have established a very successful footprint in Korea, America and the Middle East.
“Those concept cars are targeting primarily those markets and we have very strong reason to believe that they can be done very fast. They are not design models, they are fully functioning cars using a platform we already have. The business case is relatively easy to create, we just need the right amount of demand from the regions which we are gathering now. I will never give up on a coupe or convertible. I’ve been working on the idea for a very long time.”
Either would represent big a step up for the enthusiast appeal of Genesis – and surely go hand in hand with its impending Magma performance line and Genesis Magma Racing endurance team, which will fight it out at the 24 Hours of Le Mans from 2026 via a programme that also falls under the broad wing of Luc’s role. As well as orchestrating the design of the GMR-001 Hypercar – revealed in New York alongside the Gran Equator – he’s helping oversee its eventual driver line-up, too.
“We don’t have walls up between all our departments, which is why the Genesis Magma Racing team is completely integrated into the Genesis team. Our second-generation Genesis production line-up has evolved in its design language and the race car takes its inspiration from that DNA. At the same time, the great advantages of working on racecars are the lessons they bring back to your production cars.
“The most hours I’ve spent in the wind tunnel in my whole career was designing the Audi A2. It taught me so much that I could design the first Audi racecar for Le Mans. I spent more time in the wind tunnel for the A2 than the race car. The learning applies both ways.”
Is he feeling sharp with the increased challenge from Chinese brands entering Genesis’ markets? “There’s a huge number of newcomers, but I don’t see a difference based on their origins. I know a lot of my former colleagues that work with and are contributing to the success of those manufacturers.
“A big advantage we can offer is in our service, our attitude towards the customer. The root of a Korean company is paying huge respect and attention to your customers. This is something that you cannot fabricate. It’s lacking in most of the premium luxury brands, independent to where they come from and whether they are traditional or new. You cannot create a brand and enjoy long success if you don’t take care of your customers.”
“If I was worried about newcomers, I’d be in the wrong business,” he continues, building on the racing analogy. “The more competition you get, the better you get. It’s just like racing. If you are not facing challenges and competition, why carry on? You are in the comfort zone. Crisis and competition are the best ways to improve. There is no such thing as good design coming in a perfect time. The more successful a brand is, the worse its design is going to get because it’s going to get very comfortable. You don’t get creative on a beach – you get creative in a jail, trying to break out of it. The competition is the jail.”
Luc also harbours little concern for any perception of Genesis being too closely related to Hyundai. “I don’t work for a car company, I work for the Hyundai Motor Group where I can do robots, I can do advanced air mobility. I can’t do that in an automotive brand. I remember ten years ago when I was judging at the Pebble Beach concours. I had just left Bentley and Jay Leno was asking ‘what are you doing? Why are you leaving?’ I told him I had new toys to play with and he said ‘yeah, you can’t make jokes about Hyundai anymore.’”